Hollow
by snowdrop03
Summary: He breaks walls and she burns bridges. — GrayLucy / Highschool AU
1. Greetings, Magnolia

**A/N** : So, this is the new version of Hollow as the majority of you voted me to write and I, myself decided to do. It's kinda different, but the plot's the same. Still, I hope this'll be better than the previous one though :)

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><p><strong>Standard disclaimer is applied to every chapter<strong> : All credit goes to the amazing creators (Fairy Tail as owned by Hiro Mashima, plus any other random bits—which are not mine—as created by their rightful owners)

English is not my mother tongue, so please correct any grammatical or spelling mistakes I might cast, I won't mind X)

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><p>The best thing about trains is probably sitting by their windows, watching the journey turn from blurry to steadfast to purely abstract of a painting. Moss green. Emerald. Earthy brown then cyan. Mixing and squirming and shifting in the most uneven way possible.<p>

Plumpy cotton look-alikes of what must be a herd of sheep nipping on grassland passed beneath my finger. They fooled me for a while, whites bulging behind the transparent panes as if I could touch their wool for real.

I retracted my hand back, amused with the dewy trail my fingerprint had left. The cold windows emitted a pleasant feeling under my skin that I missed immediately. Staring higher on the glass surface, I saw the reflection a girl blinking behind rimmed glasses, two balls of brown staring back. It might be the trick of the light, but they seemed less duller somehow. Less from the girl's inside the mirror that morning, at least.

I rested back to the head of my seat, still eyeing the natural television of wonder—it showed a couple of spotty cows—suddenly reluctant to continue the read on my lap.

Whoever said that trains were plain boring out of all aspects of boredom must be gadget addicts without their game consoles. Or hyperactive kids without a room to be sommersaulted around. Or they weren't someone who was locked by her Dad at home for God knows how long...yeah, that too.

Oh. So that was why Mr. Caprico had such confused look in his eyes (not that his pitch-black sunglasses allowed me to see them anyway) when I asked 'what's a train like?' with an excitement that could even rival a toddler given a lollipop, not that I would admit it to anyone though. But well, certain circumstances should have permitted me to be a little awkwardly primitive beyond one's level of childishness. For it felt quite nice actually, sitting in a compartment of minimal passengers of four, despite the society contradicting and grumbling that long-term entertainment-less transportation is a mere medium of tedium. (Ignore the unintentional rhyme.)

Heh. It was fortunate enough that we had cars instead of galloping horses.

The train was quiet, just the way I liked everything to be, yet not really, because it actually rumbled and dinked on each stop in a few miles. But as hours ticked by, the constant vibrations grew to be rather calming, almost unfeeling. They may lull you to sleep even, very much like the snoring kid to my opposite.

Still, if sight-seeing the scenery that came and go was the greatest of all, then observing the passengers in their idle activity was the second best.

No, it was not yet the time for me to be preparing some research thesis, nor I was I a psychologist of some sort. I was never much of a philosopher either, burying myself in lengthy analysis of people's way of life, stating numerous theories out of them. Rather, observing had become a habit itself, coursing like a second instinct of mine. Or probably I just loved that pleasure of figuring out mysteries and piecing up puzzles, albeit simple ones, like what detectives did in suspenseful novel or movies. Besides, in the span of five hours duration, one may take more than just passerby's glance, no?

I sneaked a peek to the left side of my joint seat, finding just the perfect target of my experiment. An aged woman whose whole live and face as if composed of upside down 'u's, burried her slender nose between the pages of magazines. Her hair was unusual oldened pink (too bad I had seen Virgo's) upped so tight to a traditional bun and was tucked in the centre with a long, crescent moon tipped pin. She wore light make-up, a set of blouse in white and ankle-length skirt. Her figure was defined instead of frail and she had the air of 'stay out my way' hovering beyond and beneath. The image of a grumpy granny no one wanted to mess up with. Typical. But was she really?

I could not fathom for what reason, but I remembered Mom asking me about what I thought of people in general, probably had to do with my hesitance of mingling with them ever since I was little. I said with all the simplicity of a child that they were like books that live out their own stories. Readable, though as intriguing as those mythical fantasies, but got a really scary side within. Like the naughty trolls and evil dragons who kidnapped the princesses. Or the poisoned apple Snow White swallowed.

But then, as I grew with time and muddled myself with darkened streaks of reality, I began to wonder. What were the villains' side of story if any were ever written? Were they in actuality a real softie beneath monstrous figures? Were the heroines in as pure and innocent as they were seen?

Most books attracted readers with their cover more than a synopsis ever did. The same way people did among themselves. Self-consious with how we wanted people to regard us as, it was always appearance on top of everything else. It was a sad perception, because first impressions might be the most deceitful of all. A plain book may contain amazing values the same way an extravagant cover might wrap a boring plot. In front of you, a certain person might be all candy smiles and rainbows, but who knows if she had a sharpened knife curled behind her back ready to stab when all backs were turned?

If I were to compare with a book, the old woman would be hard-covered, difficult to penetrate. Classy in the stiffest direction, the one you didn't want to open unless you have to. A very old history book, except with padlocks.

Her outer aspects might have not piqued your interest, or you were just too lazy to find the suitable key. Society tended to act as such. They shut out everyone they couldn't figure out, but find comfort in drinking themselves in cliche. That was why outcasts were common and the odd ones were seldom appreciated.

But even if I wanted to shun them however, those people—keyless or locked or not—had already been open so wide I never had a choice but look.

The old woman was transparent in my case, albeit a thick one. It was easy to point out that her glare daggers was her second skin rather than an exposed anger- her hands weren't fisted, nor her footing was stiff. Her irises were genuine lights behind walls. They felt warm, almost a longing. I could feel it trickling through my throat.

This elicited an inner smirk of mine. _Interesting._

I hid my face behind my novel, seeing words sideways yet not reading, gaining an unnoticable angle to examine. I rendered myself to not stare too long, at least, not to seem so painfully obvious. The woman swiped her finger on a spot in her sleek-paged magazine. It was a picture, featured in an article titled "A Fury Life with Furball". A cute kitten lied on its back- a petite body inked in beige and white, a blue necklace around its neck dangling in looseness, a pair of paws were up and lively, a red ball of thread caught in between.

I tore my eyes off the photograph, not missing the glint evident in the lady's hard reddish irises, the colour no more intimidating.

Blend the insights of emotions and minor acts and clues, you'd receive a unique founding of a tsundere, as the Japanese term often stated. Outward, she was 'tsun-tsun' and icy exterior all the way, kinda rough around the edges. But, who could guess that deep within, she was just an old woman who got a soft spot for cats? The longing would explain that she was probably missing her lovely pets at home.

Unexpected much? Not really. It was all in all as applied in the golden saying 'never judge a book by its cover'.

Emotions might be hints of crossword puzzles, a ferry to a life story without having to know someone in person. A clue of a page which led you to another, and lucky chances were, they could be one's main essence.

You would possibly be asking, how could I read those locked books without any key to their padlocks?

I was one of those outcasts. The one that weirded everyone out for defying the rule of cliches. My mind was sharp to inner colours and my heart saw feelings swirl as often as I blinked.

I was _different._

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**Hollow**

Chapter 1 : Greetings, Magnolia

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"Good afternoon, dear passengers of Fiore Express!" A voice chirped from the speaker so suddenly I thought there was an announcement to a mass thievery. Shaken out of my groggy state, the elbow propping my chin quickly slid off the metal sills. It let my head drop, right onto the window surface with a loud thump.

Ouch.

"Welcome to Magnolia City," It continued curtly, ignorant to the curses I sent from the deepest of my silent grunt, "Before leaving your compartments, please check on your belongings for we wouldn't take responsibility of any of your loss. It was a pleasure to travel with you and we hope to see you again on the next trip. Have a nice day!"

A couple of musical notes ended the short speech, sequenced by sound of shifting, whirring luggages. I rubbed the pulsing point on my forehead and sighed, avoiding the amused looks my travel companions had offered. Leaning off the long cushioned seat, I bent down to pick up the novel on the carpeted floor which I'd guess had stumbled off my lap somewhere within my clumsy fiasco.

"We've arrived, honey," the redhead woman sitting to my opposite nudged gently in attempt of awaking her son-who looked about ten-out of his makeshift bed that was his soft blanket.

The kid rubbed his eyes and yawned. He reminded me of a sleepy pup. And an adorable one at that too.

"Still wanna sleep," was all the kid whined, maroon hair in messy tangles, as he gripped the soft fabric around him tighter with a clump of petite fingers.

The woman smiled patiently as she gave him another shake, "Oh really?" She sweetened her voice, "So you aren't up for Magnolia's pretty Rainbow Sakura you really wanna see?"

Two bronze eyes snapped open, so bright I could almost see stars in them. Excitement tickled my skin.

"I'm totally up, Mommy!"

The young mother laughed, patting his head affectionately, slightly messing the red locks more than they had already been, as the child released a disgruntled noise.

_"You're messing with my hair, Mommy."_

"See you later, Miss," a voice quitened my reminiscene, preventing it from flying nowhere. It was the young woman with her son.

I gave her a polite nod, preparing to leave myself as I confirmed that none of my neccesstities were left behind.

"Bye," the sweet boy waved happily which I returned with lesser enthusiasm, "And Granny too," he turned to the old lady who just nodded stiffly as respond, too busy with her own luggage—and was that a broom she was carrying?—before he disappeared behind the automatic compartment doors.

I was going to throw the bag straps onto my shoulder when I heard a jingle. My mind brimmed my realization. Rummaging through the inner pockets of my bag, I pulled out a shiny accessory, its bell-shaped pendant biasing against the sunlight. The necklace didn't fit Plue's neck anymore (guess the dog had gotten fatter) and it was probably childhood sentiment alone that urged me into bringing it.

It would fit a cat's thin neck perfectly, though.

"Excuse me, Madam," I dropped the accessory between the old woman's wrinkly fingers, "Please keep this. Have a nice day."

I waved at her once before taking off, smiling as a hint of bewilderment nipped my back.

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><p>Magnolia City was a quaint urbanization with multiple crossing of cultures, undecaying old traditions, and blooming modernity. The line of shop houses I was currently passing were varied with streaks of vintage and medieval, in which they were sticked together like terrace houses and topped with roofs of orange and red. Their brick walls were dipped in pastel paint of colourful hues and tipped with either mini balconies or long, rectangular sills. After a block or two away however, I could see that modern western and even the ethnic Asians were carved into the city's face as well. In fact, the broad water canal to the side of the road had acted as a mini Venice, complete with its stony bridges and little rowing boats on shimmering water.<p>

The city was ruled out with Magnolia flowers (now I knew where it'd got its name from), filling and beautifying the city with various shade of colours. As if were natural causes, blooms of them vined the balconies and wooden fences, while other more artificial ones were planted neatly in the long pots along the cobblestone street.

Another good thing was that the city was not over-pouring with civilization _thank goodness_, nor that it was too silent either. I wouldn't want myself to be stuffed and sucked with mash and mix of every passerby's emotions that hustled by. Sure, I had learned the method of locking a minority of them away, but still, there would be a time they could became too much to bear. Those situations felt horrible to say the least, as if your heart was beating with the rythm of somebody else's or having your head flowing with thousand of edgy, foreign images.

_Well, that issue apart_, I inhaled greedily, almost choking due to the over capacity of air stored in my lungs. My nose sighed at the pleasant sensation of smell in the air ; sweet-scented Magnolias, freshly baked bread, and the fishy smell of the river.

Never once in my life I had licked such taste of freedom.

I hopped onto the low wall bordering the water canal, gasping softly as I almost slipped. I chuckled, stretching my arms, letting the seasonal breeze drum through my fingers, slip through the gaps in between, and clap my warm cheeks. A small portion of them penetrated into my bundle of blonde locks, hidden completely inside a knitted hat. In this kind of weather, I wouldn't be any happier to take said hat off and untie my hair loose for all I cared. But then I remembered Virgo's warning to be cautious. Even a slip of disguise could reveal the littlest thing.

"Be careful, kid!" Two fishermen-or were they sailors?-called out from the moat. They were rowing a petite boat.

"Don't worry!" I shouted back, a bit touched by their genuine concern, "But thanks anyway!"

'Fun' probably would not be commonly defined as hopping along a narrow path, and posing like a failing bird with giant backpack may seemed retarded. But I didn't care. For once, there was no one scolding me on my lack of grace, no one telling me what to do, where to step and how to act. It was peaceful in its own strange way.

I may have spoken too soon, it seemed.

A blurry shadow of a built man rushed just below my chest. The force's impact sent a couple of wobbles on my legs which I quickly countered with positioning my arms in linear position, promptly halting me from plummeting into the cold river.

Before I could even respond to the stranger's rudeness, a shrill shriek interjected.

"Help!" The panic-stricken changed form in a woman with stripped shirt and Capri pants. Her mousse-coloured hair was sticking to every direction, shortly reminding me of Medusa of the Greek myth. She was having a bit difficulty of running so fast in her 7 cm-heels.

"The thief took my purse! Please help!" Onyx eyes edged in desperation, she pleaded to anyone who could hear her. There were a few pedestrians on the pavement, but most were too wrapped up with their phones or some other business to care and the remaining merely ducked their heads in attempt of being invisible.

I didn't know what possesed me, but I jumped of the ledge and readied a u-turn. Giving the woman a silent reassuring glance, I held onto my hat then dashed after the retreating thief.

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><p><strong>.Gray.<strong>

_**"WHAT DO YOU WANT, MR. FREEZER?"**_

It was my cue to yank the screeching (and hopefully not broken-speakered) phone the furthest from my already buzzing ears. For I didn't know how many triple-digits-number-of times, I prayed God would bless my auditory nerves with a little bit more resistance to yells of stupidity. No, thank you very much, I didn't want to be deaf for the rest of my life.

"Are you trying to kill me with your girly voice?" Hiding only barely a half of my huge, huge irritation, I dared to retort, once the ear-splitting screech had ended. At this point, I was fully aware of the weird glances I received from the passerbys present. I couldn't pay any less attention to them.

_"KILL YOU?"_ He hollered incredulously. The phone screeched again, _"My Geisha has just been bitten by those black-butted monkeys the moment you called! Now, you are saying that I'm trying to kill you?"_

Good grief. I pinched my forehead. Had the idiot lost some more neurons to his brain cells?

_"How you expertly ducked into the root was quite memorable,_" a different voice on the line snickered, _"And your target is 50 million too..."_

_"Shut up, Loke! That's because you threw the phone onto my nose!"_ Natsu paused for a second. I'd wild-guessed he was currently rubbing his swollen nose, _"Which means that the death of my Geisha was also __**your**__ fault!"_

_News flash, _I scoffed sarcastically. It went unheard.

_"Cocky much?"_ Loke emitted a mockery-laced snicker, _"Your score hasn't even reached the half of my 10 million record, not even a quarter of it."_

_"Do those glasses blind you? I got an awesome fifteen million!"_ Natsu snorted and I cringed. Hearing his annoying snort beyond the phone speaker was as irking as getting him to huff his stinky breathe directly into my ear.

_"It's one million and five hundred,"_ a quiet voice piped in.

_"Ha! Even Jellal could see how dim-witted you are!"_

_"Some people just have no idea how to count zeroes..."_

_"Hey! You're supposed to be on my side, Jello!"_

_"Who's Jello?"_

_"Now who's the dimwit?"_

Getting enough of this endless bickering, in addition to the full acknowledgement of what thing they were nagging about, I rolled my eyes on reflexive habit while keeping my voice as deadpanned as possible, masking the annoyance popping on throughout my veins, "I don't understand how you're all so obsessed in a lame game of escaping from monkeys in an endless freaking temple," I spat out flatly, emphasizing the word 'obsessed' like it was the dirtiest word I could think of.

_"It's called Temple Run, frozen peas!"_ Natsu's smart-assed shriek echoed over the holey speaker which I still kept 5 centimetres away from my ear for safety purposes, _"And-Oh! Gimme the Pad, Jello!"_ A rough set of shuffling swishes, a choked voice of a kind, followed with lines of colourful profanities resounded,_ "I forgot to post my epic score into Twitter!"_

_"Don't throw a phone to someone's forehead dammit!"_ Loke's voice cussed hypocritically (if I may add), before morphing itself into its 'dazzling form' or so he called it, _"Hey, what's up, Gray? Miss me?"_

"I don't have time for your gayish greetings, Loke," I sighed exasperatedly, mentally asking myself how I could have the sane mind to befriend a bunch of idiots in the first place, "I just wanna say that I am not going to Natsu's today. My sister is coming back from Hargeon."

Realizing how screwed my situation was, his tone turned wary for a while, _"You mean Ultear? Are you going to have dinner together?"_

"Pretty much," I hummed, biting back an amused smirk on the flirt's sudden change of demeanour, despite he was relating to my own issue.

There was a good minute of silence with only Jellal's and mainly Natsu's loudness at the background yelling something about 'taking turns', before Loke proceeded with his interrogation, _"You okay?"_

My lips drooped on that query, but I kept my voice convincing, "I'm good."

A heavy sigh was heard, indicating that my lie had been a total failure, _"Tell us if something happens alright?"_

"Thanks," I strained my tone to be as appreciative as ever. It wasn't that I hated his concern or him being a worrywart, but detailing about my own personal problem was not really my thing, "See you at school."

After a triplet of beeps, I deactivated the call and stared at the numbers lined on the top of the home screen, their static font indicated that it was still 5 in the afternoon.

I exhaled, swiftly locked the phone with a slide of a finger and stuffed it inside my jeans pocket.

_Two hours to go before dinner._

I sorted through my location, scratching my neck when I found it familiar yet was oblivious where. Multitasking was not a difficult issue, but walking, listening, keeping my ears safe, and talking to the phone all at once seemed to need extra concentration, especially if you were dealing with friends like...well, _those_.

Or maybe I didn't mind any destinations, as long as I was out in the city.

Bending both arms behind my head lazily, my sight span widened towards the dual sides of my peripheral vision, both packed with rows of multi-coloured shophouses decorated in such style so that the greyish-coloured street looked like an old village of some sort. But, some unlit fairy lights and the wide glass windows stuffed some senses of modernism into them, telling me that I was not standing in the middle-aged era. Several restaurants were included within those buildings, levelling from the smallest coffee shops, cafes until the fanciest of their kind, the top notches you could find in our city.

They were definitely the choices Ultear would be very content to pick out from, seeing she might not be able to either have or afford them between her busy academic life. She majored medical sciences in the University of Hargeon, taking place in the neighbouring city to the south of Magnolia. It made one of the reasons why the occasional dinner should be attended in the first place. Because transportation fees halted her going back and fro between Hargeon and Magnolia so often, she rented an apartment room not far from the unversity and later made a deal with Mom that she would come home once every two weeks.

It gave me chills. The huge possibility that she would choose that seafood restaurant again this time. Seeing the wooden placate of the shack's name and one of its waitress winking at me through the transparent door right know wasn't helping either. I hoped in the name of all miracles of existence that Mom would forget that it was Ultear's turn to pick and have me or Lyon choose this time. Not that I was so sure Lyon wouldn't take advantage of his chance to aggravate me all the same. I had some blackmails to threaten him just in case, anyway.

But then again, Mom's memory was as tough as a nail. You wouldn't believe how she remembered my chore schedule so perfectly.

I groaned, holding myself back into thinking of those large portions of spicy prawns and smelly squids which I was forced to devour and finish, insisting a certain someone was on a sudden craving for diets like she had done months ago...knowing full well that those cooked sea creatures were on the top of my things-to-puke-at list. And don't even try talking me about the devilish chillies, you wouldn't dare know how evil they could become. The continuation of this pathetic story? Let's just say I ended up in the toilet once I had gotten home for hours with the symptoms of bad _bad_ stomach.

Seriously, sometimes it sucked to be me.

Was this a simple prank the youngest sibling had to endure? I didn't quite think so. Ever since that night four years ago, let's just say our relationship was a bit...strained. It was why I took these walks, bearing the reason of 'cooling around the city' as a golden excuse that was never totally wrong. My head needed a 'cooling off' anyway, from the house's rather suffocating atmosphere. I was only there to create awkwardness in the family after all, for Mom's effort to 'reunite' us was to no avail and Lyon's constant jokes to lighten everything up was getting even older and drier.

"Help!" A scream erupted through the peaceful evening air, immediately pulling me back from my melodramatic anecdote.

I swung my head to left and right, then straight at the tri-junction which a few metres distance to my front, finding none plausible enough to release that high-pitched yell. My confusion was directly forgotten once I stared right through the scenery glorified around me. The checkered-patterned path was illuminated with street lamps, creating a calming combination with the colourful buildings hovering towards the orange canvas of the skies, puffs of pinkish cotton splattering on it.

On habit, my fingers swiftly moved towards my chest where the camera was usually hung, only causing them to touch my bare skin.

_Of all times I leave it at home!_ I cursed grumpily, _And where is my shirt too?_

"Please help!" Another hysterical yell sounded.

This time, I saw a flash of golden-yellow passing through the path in front of me, oblivious to my presence.

Intrigued by the colour, I chased after it-assuming it was the said 'thief'-the lost shirt and SLR quickly forgotten.

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_Who's that?_ An eleven year old tilted his head, curiosity tugging his mind. His mother was crouched down and sobbing, hugging a girl that looked like a mini clone of herself. His brother was on the opposite side, staining two tear splotches on the girl's shirt.

It felt rude to interupt. The boy played with his fingers, feeling left out. But he wanted to know who made his family so sad!

He met his mother's eyes then, they were both happy and sad, weary and bright, beckoning him to approach, and the next second he blinked, he had joined the group hug.

He gained a better look of the girl. She looked a couple of years older, with shiny hair and scrutinizing dark pools so hard it almost render him flinching. They spoke of a silent warning, whatever it was for, and the boy swore the heaving throb in his chest had switched onto his stomach. But then she slung her arms behind his neck as if nothing had passed, a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes playing on her lips.

He could feel a grin within his brother's choke.

"Welcome home, Ultear-nee."

His heart dropped, bewildered eyes widening.

He never knew he had a sister.

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><p><em>What are feelings? Just another chemical reactions?<em>

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><p><strong>Temple Run<strong> : I'm pretty sure most of you know what Temple Run is. Anyway, it is a game you can play in either iPad or iTouch of escaping from monkeys in a temple. The further you run, the higher score you would get. (Check on wiki for details)

_No offence to whoever likes this game. In fact, I am sorta 'obssessed' with it too._

**Geisha** (a traditional Japanese dancer) : refers to Karma Lee, the only Asian character in Temple Run. I made Natsu called her by my self-made nickname :p

**Tsun tsun** (turn away in disgust) + **dere dere** (be lovey dovey) = **tsundere** (a typical manga/anime character who is shown to be hostile towards others but will gradually show their warm side/ cold outside - warm inside)

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><p><strong>AN :** This chapter may leave lots of questions on your side, but don't worry, everything will be explained eventually.

So...review anyone?

P.s : can anyone guess who's the granny on the train? If you're able to answer (though it might be so obvious), I shall reward you with...sweet virtual lollipops? :9

*Please read my other GraLu fics "Jumbled Feelings" and "Babysitting Issue" X)*

~snowdrop03

_Last edited : December 16, 2012_


	2. Piled Misunderstandings

**Chapter 2: Piled Misunderstandings**

**A/N** : I'm really, really sorry for updating so late. I edited this numerous time but it just never seem right, so I left it for a while. Fortunately, I got my inspiration back again since there are some who bugged me to update, and it made me sort of happy to realize that there are readers who actually wait for this story, so thank you very much for that X)

Big thanks to all of you who have alerted, faved, and reviewed too, as always~

_Replies to anon :_

**YOURslave :** lol. I'm glad you like it. Thank you for the kind review, you made my day! :D

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><p><strong>Chapter 2 : Piled Misunderstandings<strong>

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**.Lucy.**

"Ouch!"

Tiny nerves bulged and stiffened under the worn-out set of baggy jeans as my left knee contacted against the fence's untangled wire. It stung, as if a lit matchstick had grazed across it in a fair diagonal pattern. Contemplating how it'd leave a huge, horrible red mark, I cringed, barely aware of the fact that I had climbed and hopped over the said metal fence _and_ had arrived on the other side safely, putting the scratch and (more) damage to my pants aside, that is.

_"_What in Fiore...," I murmured between my raging breaths, the remains of adrenaline pushed my legs to paddle a bit faster, while my vision were solely concentrated on the retreating form of a man in black to my front, "...is that foxy thief trying to do?"

It was a rhetorical question, really. For I had figured out the 'what' and 'why' things were the way they were, yet still idiotically, stupidly (and whatever associated to 'dumbass') had followed him nevertheless.

Long story short, this had been the fifth alley I had found myself stumbling into, the third fence I had hastily jumped over, currently the sixth bush I had bulled in through (sorry, Mr. Bush) and the list of troublesome hurdles went on and on and on...

Of course it was all in my disadvantage, since I wasn't any more familiar with Magnolia than a kitten inside a dark, dirty sack. Me losing track of him was the main idea, got me troubled was his glee, and having me to troll with was obviously a plus point. Probably though, he, like every other cocky man, just had a discriminative assumption that I'd be skimpy enough to be defeated by those hurdles...

It was clear that he had underestimated me.

Let's just say that I had quite an experience in athletic hurdles by infiltrating out of the mansion in occasions. So everything in the same pace as escaping through the third floor's window sills, straying from unsuspecting guards, and climbing up a tall tree in order to get back to my room, were all pretty much my customary side hobbies.

_"Come on, Lucy! You can do it!"_A boy's voice sprung onto the brink of my mind, loud and echoingly clear; his pitch was still childishly shrill, sugar-coated with innocent warmth, an unhidden ecstasy dripping in its very core.

_Oh yeah,_the bitter-sweet nostalgia of my childhood looped a tiny smile on my lips. An attendance of a cheery spectator and a fellow 'adventurer' were the things missing if I were to recall those semi-dull memories of me being stuck in that horrid of a house. The gentle taps on my windows were the only sounds I had ever longed for, when my every pit of depression was proved pointless by just sitting side by side under the bazillion dots of star, knees touching sheepishly, silent laughter filled every single night like we were the last kids alive on earth. He'd tell me how to sip a honeysuckle without ruining its petals, and would stuff me with a bunch of information in which part of the mansion had a loose shift of guards, which jutting bricks was safe enough to climb on...

It had been the first time I thought of something as _fun_, ever since my once-perfect life had turned upside down.

But it was true that you had to hold on tight to what you had already had a grip on, for it could be slipping through your fingers before you were even aware of it. It started with his absence on one night, then it rolled into another, the night after it, the day after next...there was no more hitting of little knuckles against glass, none, _not_ ever.

A grunt escaped my throat in seconds, and I mentally scolded myself for yet again, drowning myself in the past. What was the point on brooding in those that couldn't be changed? The purpose of me coming here was to leave all of them behind and started everything anew, wasn't it?

Nails dug deeper into my palm, a chuckle escaped my throat, bitter, dipped in full irony and sarcasm. _Great, now I sound like a newly released criminal who is trying to atone her sin._

Every other thought was caught hanging in my head and my nose noticeably relaxed on the change of air; the damp, disgusting scent of the alley had switched into the original smell of the city and the temporarily non-existent sun rays had welcomed my skin once again.

I sucked in the whole new smell and took in the scenery around my reachable radius, pretty much relieved that I was no longer in a dark, dump alley of a place. I swore my nostrils would shrink themselves on the dampness of the ever so needed oxygen.

This street the thief had led me was unexpected though. Sure, it was another open path with less population residing within it like every other safe path he had chosen. Yet, this one I observed was a tad different; the buildings mostly stood far-fetched from each other and those gaps were enclosed with secluded field of trees and greeneries. A few metres to the front stood a gate, large letters of "You're now leaving Magnolia" imprinted on its wooden plate positioned on its very top.

The coward was intending to leave the city.

That fact downed a big too-late realization on me, like I was dropped with a ton of bricks. Was I really going to chase after him forever? As in following him to another town? Why didn't I call the police in the first place anywa- oh yeah I didn't have any cell phone with me, not to mention I should have asked someone for a public phone in the very first place.

A palm met my ceased forehead, massaging it in annoyance. How unbearably stupid of me, getting my mind so fatally irrational. I figured that I was getting too influenced with both the woman's and thief's franticness, and it overwhelmed all of my rational logic. I still hadn't learnt do differentiate the mixed up feelings of my own and the others, it seemed.

As if sensing my self-cursing mode, the man turned his head towards me for a millisecond, providing me time to digest his appearance ; unshaved square-shaped chin edged by tough cheeks line, double studded earrings on one of his ears adding a sense of hostility, and strands of brown jutting out of his black hat messily, shadowing the strange glints carved in his coaly orbs; a cross between victory, a hint of relief, and fear. Nevertheless, a knowing smirk of mischief donned his lips, acknowledging that I had almost ran out of stamina and practically was screwed.

My brain ran faster than my feet, and before I knew it I had released one strap of my backpack, turned it against my chest, and frantically rummaged through it.

Snacks? No. Ipod? No_no_. Pens? You must be kidding me. Plue's blankie? ...What is it doing in my bag again?

When I was about to think that my rummaging effort would be in vain, my hasty fingers brushed against something hard-textured and edgy, and a familiar smell of papery greeted my nose as the object's pages began to flap in response to the wind. Realizing what object I was referring to, hesitance jerked my touch on it for merely a second or so, my mind debating on what I should do. But with it being the toughest and most plausible weapon for the function present all my doubts evaporated away.

I closed one of my eyes almost painfully out of habit, before snapping it open and swiftly threw the said object to my front.

A satisfying 'thud' was heard as soon as the hard-covered book (hopefully) hit the light out of the man on the head, followed by a rough 'thump' of his fall, my Godly 'weapon' hitting the ground, and the stolen hand bag thrown near it.

I had never felt so accomplished in my whole life of fourteen years.

Huffing slightly, I approached the two objects (scratch the thief) in sight and crouched down to take them. My bookworm's instinct quickly felt the grazed book with my fingers in mixed relief and irritation ; it was only scratched on the cover but hardly noticeable, though the contents fortunately remained safe. I put it back inside my bag, zipping it noisily and stood up with the stolen leather bag in my arms.

The latter was interrupted with a strong grip circling my wrist. I emitted a surprised squeak and made the wrong move of staring right into the thief's eyes. Hatred, dark, _dark_ animosity swimming within its shadowed irises.

"Hand me," he whiffed with tiny difficulties, orbs glinting, hand rubbing the back of his head in fury, "The bag!"

I was thrown downwards onto the street, leather bag hugged against my chest so tight as if my life depended on it, and the last thing I knew, my glasses had fallen on the stony path with a click.

* * *

><p><strong>.Gray.<strong>

What the _hell_ was I doing?

That question remained ringing on every step I took and though I had only understood a half of the whole predicament, I went with all of it anyway; strange, true, yet definitely and undeniably _pointless_.

I slowed down, sterilized my fastening huff and ran a palm throughout my raven locks, a thing that somehow had became a habit when everything just seemed so murky. Stripping was a way different matter of course, since I did it almost every time without even thinking.

To recap this whole thingy : I was chasing after a boy which I assumed to be a thief, I lost sight of him in one alley, he reappeared, I lost sight of him again, then somehow magically he just popped out in the corner, and now I lost him again. That cycle had repeated about two times already.

Seriously, was he some sort of ninja?

That flame head (aka ninja wanna-be) really had to learn from him if he was. That way, he would perfectly understand that a ninja didn't say 'nin-nin' like some sort of code language and obviously did not encircle a white muffler around his face to cover his identity.

I sighed in exasperation and skidded my feet to a stop, rotating my vision throughout the location and once again discovering the absence of blond.

I didn't even know why I was doing this; intrigued, interested or whatever feelings I had come in contact before had been long gone after this tiring chase. Probably dropping this issue would be much better, since it had got nothing to do with me in the first place anyway.

I scratched the back of my neck, though it wasn't itchy at all, feeling more exhausted all of a sudden, "Right, I should probably drop—"

An indignant yell sliced so sharp into the air and I abruptly paused from turning back to where I had come from. My ears perked up at the voice and my feet automatically followed the source which so happened to be nearby. Two figure stood up in the distance; the blond who I supposed was my target and an unknown brunette.

"Huh?" I murmured, blinking in confusion, "It's the city's gate already?"

"You insolent little brat!" The brunette which I assumed was an older male screamed at the fallen blond, who was crouched on the street, clutching a brown bag so tight. The tone of the man wasn't one I might call buddy-buddy.

"Insolent? You are the one who stole if I recall," The blond replied calmly and I almost gaped for a bit. How could he manage that monotone voice of his when it was like the intimidating man would rip off his head in any second?

"Back off and don't try to be a goody two shoes!" The man spat back, hands gripping the boy's upper arms in such bone-cracking kind of intensity.

"I am not," came the another almost nonchalant response, "I'm just returning what does not belong to you in the first place."

I halted my motion on sneakily approaching them when I heard that sentence, my eyes widening in disbelief.

He wasn't the thief? Wait wait, I was obviously lost.

"It's none of your business!" The built man snatched the bag harshly, but the boy wasn't giving in, until something shiny flashed in the corner of my periphery, silver and metallic, like a knife.

My heart lowered to my diaphragm, my respiration ascended to such speed when I realized the extreme ugliness of the situation. I acted on pure instinct; legs knelt behind one of the nearby bushes, hand rummaging through my pocket in search of my phone. Once it was out, I grinned deviously; seemed like Natsu's prank tool could be of a good use after all.

* * *

><p><strong>.Lucy.<strong>

I toppled back on my butt, twice if I must count. This was getting tiring, even hitting the hard bag onto the thief's nose wasn't helping. To summarize them, violence and stubbornness wouldn't work, since the thief topped in both factors, though I could notice that impatience had grabbed hold of him as well. Beads of cold sweat trailed along my cheeks, and my arms and legs had turn into weak jellies, yet my grip still wouldn't surrender, which I was glad for. Desperation had fully controlled me since I didn't know any official form of self-defence, besides kicking the groin and punching blindly (if you could call those official). Yet, I knew letting go was futile, because surely the man would flee as soon as I did, with the bag that is.

It was when the man took out a small dagger from his pants that I assumed things were at its worst. My pupils dilated and my guts churned in a horrible roller-coaster turn, cold ran down my spines in seconds. But before I could digest everything else, or even sense the slight hesitance of the man, a resonant siren blew.

A police siren.

To say that I was relieved was an understatement.

A sound of a closing car followed and I swore if it wasn't for my situation, I would have laughed at the hilarious expression the man presented; his eyes had grown as wide as a sauce pan, mouth gapping like a dehydrated fish and arms quivering in fear. Emotion after emotion flashed through his dark orbs before he pushed me backwards with a thud, my butt met the street once again, surprisingly forgetting the object he had stolen in my arms. He quickly headed to the gate without looking back, but not before taunting, "He's the one who stole it!"

Not only foxy, he was also putting the entire burden on me. What a fantastic human being. And wait...did he just say 'he'?

"Stop right there!" Two policemen with guns in hand strolled to where the man had gone and soon disappeared to who-knows-where.

_"Hands up!"_

I jumped at the sound of that strict voice and had almost (_almost_ I told you) really held up my hand if I hadn't heard of a couple of blurry gunshots, an abrupt pause afterwards, and a too-cool-for-school styled _"mission accomplished"_ bared in a comical husky tone before all went silent and still, like a broken CD player.

When the nearby shrub rustled, I felt like I got the idea.

"Hey," I called out to the bush which somehow flinched, "Come out whoever you are."

There were a few moments of awkward quiescence, before a from popped out of it with a livelier swish, revealing a... half-naked teen about my age, with a phone secured between his fingers. I wasn't kidding when I said he was half-naked, because he was indeed topless, with only a pair black torn jeans in tact. His expression was indescribable. It was clear that embarrassment and relief were emitted form him, but he tried covering it with a mask of indifference, which I knew was failing miserably because the red on his cheeks and the constant fiddling of his hands were totally giving away.

The second silence hung rather thickly, before I voiced out the first thing on my mind.

"Are you a runaway exhibitionist?"

...

_"W-what?"_

* * *

><p><em>Some encounters are unfathomable.<em>

* * *

><p><strong>AN** : I am aware that Lucy is OOC, but I intended for it to be that way, and Gray indeed referred to Lucy as 'he' because of well...read on :) sorry, it's a bit short and not informative enough, but I just have to put a cliffy there and dump all the information on the next chappy :p

~snowdrop03

_Last edited : December 6, 2012_


	3. Of Shopping and Everything Nice

**A/N** : Hi, everyone who is still reading. I hadn't updated ever since *looks at the update date and gasps* 4 months ago?!

I honestly thought it was just 2 months ago...

I'm so so so sorry, I'm just plain busy with school, and _yes_ writer-blocked.

When I came back, everything in this chapter was just so wrong that I rewrote it all. And I'm sooo happy that it only took 2 days! *wootwoot*

As for the replies of the reviews, I'll do it as soon as my schedule stretches just fine! But I'll let you know I've read them all. My infinities of thanks to you! And for those who alerted and faved too!

* * *

><p>Her sides were soft, so was her above.<p>

They smelled like springs and lilacs and butterfly touches, and she leaned against them, beneath them, around them; nudging, clenching, feeling _her_, forgetting.

The blackness embraced her, and she hid herself to crave for more, hoping for it to swallow her whole (_lesser to see, lesser to think, lesser to feel, easier to forget_). She clutched onto every shadow, and drowned in the mild satisfaction that no one would find her.

It didn't end long.

A line of white cracked in, blinding, as did a playful voice.

"Hey, it's dinner."

She flinched away, almost scared.

"Go away, onii-chan," she told him, half croaking, pulling every trace of darkness around her like a blanket.

"So the closet is your new playroom, huh?"

She stayed still, ignoring the laughter evident in his wake, willing him to go. No, he couldn't see her like this. He'd tease, he'd assume she was weak, he'd find out she was a freak!

If ever he took the hint, he seemed to shrug it off.

"You sure you won't regret?" A sneer remarked, and the light spread wider as the door creaked aloud, "It's your favourite cur-"

"GO AWAY!"

Her back collided against the wooden back of the wardrobe (she could hide no more), sob bubbles bursting as she curled into herself. She wanted nothing but peace and tranquility and darkness could comply it for her, she never asked to be found, she never asked for light, she just wished to be alone once w while.

She didn't want to feel.

Couldn't he understand that?

The silence that followed hurt, for she was sure he had left. Like anybody else did to her. Like Mom. Like Dad. Like _them_.

Instead, there was a hug, one that was better than the sweet darkness, warmer than the smell of her mother's clothes she had been clinging onto, more than anything.

Before she knew it, her walls had crumbled.

.

.

.

**Chapter 3 : Of Shopping and Everything Nice**

.

.

.

**.Lucy.**

Should I relate with an object, I'd say emotions are like some kind of radio waves.

They curve and travel and linger in the air, waiting for a receptor to yield them in. Some are transpired cleanly and coherently, some are between the blurs, while the others remain completely vague. But, unlike those signals who depends on the weather, they always exist albeit circumstances.

A few of them strike like rumbling roller coasters that scream of upside-down chaos, a miniscule of them pelt like a warm downpour in mid-winter, a couple of others are laced with rainbows and sprinkle like condensed sugar.

His was a crossbreed of everything spontaneous: splashed like ice-cold water in a pail, heavy as if swallowing a line of pebbles, flushed like the burning of matches.

But then as short-lived as they surfaced, they were gradually repressed, inch by inch. Not perfectly nor did they were washed completely, but it did just fine to lessen his clenching-unclenching fist, minimize his widened irises, brush the runny nerve out of his way, and render his stance determined.

For some reasons, automatic or not, he had readied a mask.

Oddly though, he reminded me of myself.

"What...," a cough brought me back to my senses, "What gained you that," his brows furrowed in a funny way, seemingly seeking for more appropriate words to say. Lips were then tightly pursing as he found them, "...Rude assumption?"

_Rude assumption?_ I pondered, still bleary with emotions as I watched the dirt beneath my shoes, then the sky and the semi-empty plane, then back to the boy for clue.

At the sight of his finely muscled chest, the thoughtless statement came rushing back, dumping a giant 'oh' on my forehead.

_"Are you a runaway exhibionist?"_

Ha, me and my stupid single-track minded mouth...

I looked back at him and noticed that he had allowed (or was it 'accidentally slipped'?) a slit of annoyance to grace his feature, tapping his feet impatiently on the ground that I almost saw dusty trails surrounding it.

It sounded mildly entertaining, but it occurred to me that person was trying to keep his cool in front of a stranger. Really, people and their obsession with first impressions...

I could have worded it better, but I blatantly shot it anyway.

"You are...half-naked?"

He craned his neck below, just realizing what I had pointed out in the first place and blinked, twice, thrice, as if he'd grown five tentacles, and red bit on his ears in seconds.

(I swore there was a sound akin to a mixture of pitched squeak and gasp and marvel in the middle of those momentums.)

His mouth gapped to form a come-back and I would have amused myself in his embarrassing predicament if there wasn't a new voice, melodious and feminine, interrupting him.

"Excuse me, are you the one who got my purse back?"

It was a woman; middle-aged, brunette, formal shirt, and Capri pants. She peered expectantly at me.

"Ah," feeling a bit idiotic, I chirped in suddenly, a faint recognition I let dripping freely beneath my words, "Sorry, this should be yours."

The woman took her bag off my wrist, slightly weighing it before a beam bloomed over her lips, a curve of red against brightening dimpled cheeks, grateful and earnest and so so ecstatic, "Thank you so much."

How she didn't even take a second glance to check if her precious objects were really in there was beyond me. For anyone might know, a teenager in their destructive state like me (not that I was brutal or anything) could have taken and used them for anything...imaginable.

It always confused me how someone could be so trusting to someone she just met.

An inner, almost unheard question sprang out and added in disbelief.

_And to me, of all people?_

I pressed down the swelling feeling inside my chest, it felt pleasant yet too smug to my liking so I breathed it out as I settled on a light-toned, "No problem, Miss."

This broadened the lady's simper before her onyx pools flickered over my shoulders. If possible, it just got even bigger.

I was surprised his bizarre appearance did not faze her.

"Did your friend help?" Seemingly mistaking our surprise with confusion, she corrected, "Are you brothers?"

I gave the 'not-exhibionist' (well, he did deserve a nickname) a look as he did the same (how could she easily assume a blonde and a brunette were ones of the same genetics?), but then our redeemed protest were backtracked by a short gasp of the woman and a swift check to her expensive watch.

"Ah! I'm late for work!" She whispered, loud enough for us to hear, then muttered something in the lines of "Boss is gonna kill me", followed by a string of dignified profanities and a frustrated brush to her mouse-coloured bangs.

"Maybe it isn't much...but here," she forced something she had pocketed to the palm of my hand, her pedicured nails almost digging into my skin, "Bye, and thank you once again, kids! Sorry, I'm in a hurry!"

Thus, she stalked off, tripping once in her journey and disappeared in the distance.

I recovered from my stunned-induced silence, and dragged my eyes down. A crumpled notes of 'not much' 500 Jewels lied within the mounts of my hand.

A sudden epiphany popped inside my head before I could stop myself.

I pointed at the boy, noting that it was the first time he really met my eyes.

"You need a shirt."

* * *

><p>"...Were <em>we<em> just kicked out?"

The boy leaned his head backwards, eyes on the shop houses' roof. His spiky locks of raven made a light bristle as it knocked against the wall and he exhaled heavily, as if seeing this thing coming from afar, "Yes. Yes, we were."

I couldn't form a word nor a response, suddenly exhausted. Now that I think about it, who in their right minds would allow someone with an exhibiting tendency to scare the customers out of their store, let alone would hang out with them?

Inwardly, I groaned at the weight of irony._ Me that's who..._

"You know...we don't have to buy it," he reasoned with a spark of hesitance. Embarrassed or too guilty to burden a person he just met, I was way too baffled to analyze which, "I have spares anyway."

"Spares?" Arms folding, I deadpanned, "At home?"

"...Well _duh_," he answered a second too late, marking he had just utter it within a whim, then peered at me, head tilting slightly, "We should've gotten you new glasses. They're broken, aren't they?"

"I have spares," I echoed him, feeling his silent smirk as I did, then quickly added, "They are neutral-lensed."

The brunette sighed, one hand traveled up through his hair. He'd done it plenty of times already, "Thing is, this is the only clothing shop nearby," he explained reluctantly, popping my hopes like needles on balloons, "Unless we take another blocks of people staring. There's a good chance of police arresting me for public nudity too."

I snapped my head so viciously at him that my hat almost tipped off its place. His last query horrified me, if not just a little bit. With him captured as a criminal, I, who was walking with him would absolutely be assumed as his comrade. One thing to another would lead me into interrogation, revelation of my disguise, they'd find out I was one of the wealthiest heiress of Fiore, Dad knew, and I'd be sent back home.

I painfully cringed. That kind of situation is just a nono_no_.

"Then take the money quick and go dress up at home," I suggested out of desperation, but refused to show it.

"We're through about the money thing," he stared head on stubbornly (we had argued about who took it moments ago, ended up in circle and decided to divide it by shopping each of our need). Such concern would have flattered me if I wasn't cursed in a condition such as this.

"Besides, Mom will kill me," his expression drained a shade and somehow I got a feeling that his mom may really have a katana in hand at the sight of him bare-chested and mutilate him in multiple slices, I kinda pity seeing him like that, to be honest, "Why don't you go in alone then?"

His nonchalance appalled me, absorbing my previous tiny-bity pity of him, "You expect _me_ to shop at a men's underwear shop?"

"Afraid of getting lost?" A scoff followed, "You are not a five-year-old, dude."

I almost, almost gave him a disapproving snort about his lack of knowledge in the etiquette department (Aquarius really did rub it on me), before every little cracked pieces of puzzle I hadn't regarded matched themselves together into an unwanted picture.

_"__**He**__ stole it!"_ The thief had yelled to me.

_"Are __**you**__ brothers?"_ The face of the smiling lady popped out.

_"You are not a five-year-old, __**dude."**_

Dude.

Yes, **dude**.

I gapped behind my fingers, keeping my tongue from splating onto the stone pavement.

No way.

He, no, _they_ all thought I was a _dude_.

(A beret hiding my hair into a cropped cut, a baggy sweatshirt, baggy jeans, sneakers... I sighed contemplatively, Virgo and her taste of cosplaying me...)

A part of me actually was relieved, because in the name of everything holy I finally got a reason to not enter the store of taboo lingerie and everything not nice! Like, _yay._

_Are you nuts?_ Another part of my rationality protested otherwise, _He is about your age! What if by any chance, you went to the same school, he knew you as the cross-dressing freak he met in the streets (though unintentional), laughed at your face, and tell it to the world?_

(Well, maybe not that world-wide. But hey, people have Facebook and Twitter going on nowadays, do they?)

The idea of my minimal exposure being snatched away before I even had a glimpse of it, scared me as much as being arrested.

I sized him up once more, calmed myself down in a blur of heartbeats and indecisiveness, managing a question of, "Grab an L-sized plain t-shirt and pay?"

I gained a roll of eyes ('are you an idiot or what?'), and in the most unnoticeable manner gulped all my insides.

Pushing the glass doors open, feigning indifference, half-praying the shop owner would just kick me out once again, I was in.

It seemed like a normal, white-painted store with shelves and hangers (as long I didn't stare at all the masculinitaries, everything is well), and I almost concluded that it wasn't all that bad of an experience, until I saw _her_ or rather heard a pair of click-clacking high heels. In place of the burly, stunted, hairy man who kicked us out, there poised a busty woman, all tight in dress and a superficial mole below her eyes.

The speed of the shift change astounded me.

"May I help you?" she bent, intentionally granting me a view of her half-exposed cleavage, a not-so innocent smile on her glossed lips, "Briefs or boxers?"

* * *

><p><strong>.Gray.<strong>

It was insane that these strange occurrences grew to be so damn normal.

Maybe it was the side effect of my too-often sense of boredom or a little part of my aphatic nature (as appointed by Loke) that even an experience you believed only happened in movies and clichés (I mean, come on, who would have faith in fateful encounters and love at first sight?), would left me un-amazed.

Not that this circumstance was completely expected on my side, nor it was not odd in any way, and that I didn't feel the tiniest bit of surprise but still...

I had the urge to clap my forehead in concern of the nonsense swirling in my head, but then remembered both of my hands were gripping a plastic tray. Unless I wanted the two hotdogs and icy beverages fling somewhere onto a stranger's lap or (not preferably) my face, I rather had to hold it in.

I couldn't fathom for the life of me that I had to agree with the scatter-brained Natsu on this one. Thinking (about useless things) _indeed_ was exhausting.

Catching a sight of grey beret and juts of yellow, I turned into said direction, pulling the red spinning seat under the bar-like table with one of my legs, and plopped the white tray on its wooden, splintered surface.

The boy who was the major source of this so-called 'normal' situation seemed to not acknowledge my presence. One elbow propping his chin, caged brown eyes were glued on the wide glass window positioned to our opposite, in times glancing from left to right, back and forth, as if calculating how many vehicles and excited kids had run by.

I sneered wryly inside. Tough luck with that, Saturday's crowded street was just way _too_ perfect for counting.

Contemplating it would be somewhat rude to call out on him, I pushed the tray slightly more to our in-between's than my front, waiting for the scratchy swish that followed.

This gained his attention wholly as those faraway glints in his caramel pools disappeared, being exchanged with a coat of confusion and finally a dull understanding.

(Or maybe I was just visualizing it, considering his face wasn't any filled with expression than he already was before.)

"Oh. Thanks," the blond kid, who called himself Lucas, muttered, palms scrambled around the hot dog's paper wrapping, fingers pressing against the pillow-like surface that the mustard was ready to burst.

It didn't though, fortunately.

I nodded an answer, peeling my own hot dog off its wrapping and dug in the smell of ketchup and the heat of smoky sausage, realizing that my stomach couldn't lie out of its hunger anymore.

The clock ticked for ages, accompanied with the honks and humps of cars, tipped with childish laughter and pouty whines, and the high-fives of assembling teenagers sitting and leaning around the circle tables. Yet, in contrast of all, neither of us spoke a word or made another eye contact. Just the sound of crumpling papers almost infused with the noisy surrounding, soft nibbles, and slurps to our side that reminded us of the presence of one another.

It was clear that he was off flying to his own world again, while I was forced to devour the silence that lingered.

(And my hot dog of course, but yeah you knew what I meant.)

This empty interval sent me back to my pondering spree, vaguely remembering that there was quite plenty of minutes left to go before dinner. Good thing I stuffed some snacks in, in case we were really going to have some seafood. I'd rather miss dinner than going anyway.

I pulled at my bangs at the thought, frustrated, feeling pathetic. How could I prefer eating with a stranger than my own family?

"Thank you."

I abruptly turned left, slightly unsure if the soft-spoken voice originated from Lucas since his lips had pursed back into biting his food. He had been so quiet (and slightly pale) upon being out of the lingerie store, so I was a little bit relieved on this recovery. Not that he was categorized into the chatty type, but I had the absurd hunch that I had offended him in a way and/or was somewhat the reason beneath his silent treatment.

"Uh...," scratching the back of my head, I replied, doubt lacing my query, "If it's the food, you should thank that woman instead."

He shook his head.

"I am grateful for your help with the thief," he settled shortly, still looking ahead, and I noticed the way he nibbled on the puffy bread. It was a careful bite, not small neither too gluttonous, as if it was set so any sauce won't spill on his cheeks, or even his teeth, and that was saying _something_. I wouldn't assume it was girly, but if I was lacking for a better term, I would say that it was 'graceful'.

Self-conscious, I licked my upper lip. It tasted of mustard.

"I must thank you too," I decided, taking a sip of my mint-lemon squash, then pinched my new white attire with a thumb and an index finger, "For buying the shirt for me, I mean."

He didn't especially show it, but I got the feeling he was suppressing a grin. The twitch of his lips gave it away.

It was discomforting, because I didn't know whether it was my mind playing tricks on his stoic composure again.

He took a quiet slurp, "I guess tricking the thief with a police ringtone is acceptable."

His statement successfully froze my hand midway, and I was thankful for that short tactfulness for I had almost ended up sticking the blue straw of my drink into my nostrils.

"How do you know?" I slowly asked, pushing back the embarrassed heat crawling through my neck, figuring that denial wouldn't get me anywhere.

He was silent for a short while before answering, "My brother used to prank me all the time."

"With the same ringtone?" I asked.

He shook his head once more.

"No. Crying baby. He said I was pregnant."

I bit back an attack of chortles. _Manners, Gray, manners_, "And you believed it?"

A pout caught me off guard, "I was _four._"

With it, the rope to my self control broke loose. Laughter popped out of my guts like confetti, tickling every length of my stiffened nerves. I clamped it with my fingers, but it did nothing to prevent some customers for staring at me like I'd grown three heads and the blond from flattening me with his stare and throwing his head back to the window. His cheeks weren't red and other people would take that he wasn't affected, but I knew he was chewing his insides with his lips pursed too tight.

"Oh _joy_," he remarked monotonously, "Didn't receive enough of it last Christmas?"

"Sorry," I reduced my stupor, mindlessly patting him on the head, still having the energy to tease him, "Man, you're adorable."

He flinched on my touch, eyes widening considerably for a fraction of second, flickers of something indescribable danced in his pupils before it drowned back into flecks of brown. Then, in the speed of light, he ducked his head low, and hid it with his folded arms on the table with a 'thump'. Lucky they missed the food residue or his long sleeves would certainly be stained.

I didn't fail to see what shade pink his ears had become.

Unfreezing my paused finger in the air, I went back laughing, like it was the last thing I was responsible to do, hitting my fist against my thigh in the process, and wondered the last time I had such fun this way.

_Is this how having a little brother like?_

_(Maybe just maybe, Ultear feels this way too?)_

My heart drooped down my stomach and I choked on my chuckles when he startled me once again, this time with his head up.

"These hot dogs...," he started slowly, round face once again devoid of expression, but no hiding that a certain urgency was lied within, "...They do not use dog meat for these, do they?"

* * *

><p><strong>.Lucy.<strong>

_Today I met a strange exhibionist.—_

I wrote inside my head, as I walked ahead the road full of houses, a piece of memo in possession.

_—And humiliated myself in front of him God knows how many times._

I clenched the small, worn-out paper, finding a sudden wish to tear it off to abstract pieces as did my mental diary, but then remembered Yoga (_breath in, breath out, repeat_) and gained control of myself.

_It's not like I'm screwed_, I cheered myself up. _The school's disguise is different so he won't recognize, he didn't even ask on my suspicious big bag so my secret's safe and sound, my exposition's won't be threatened and everyone will live happy ever after, yet..._

No one, other than my big brother, had ever laughed at me _that_ way.

The thought was so abrupt and piled that I blinked at its force.

It was a fact nonetheless. And a bitter one to boot.

I rested a palm on top of my head in reflex. It was warm and it lingered on my skin.

"No one but Mom ever pat me like that too," I voiced aloud to the sky, a thing I found myself often did when I was alone. I wasn't sure what I expected, but it seemed to be the only inkling form of hope that hadn't subsided, that _he_ in all illogical ways would return even after he had left, that wherever he was, he could answer me in connection of the same sky we loved and lived under.

I halted on my step, my right toe knocking with an empty can with a thud.

(_Hope, what is it again?_)

I picked the can up, threw it at the nearby trash bin. It rolled on the tip of the large square bin, before dropping into the hole, its hollow clank of emptiness echoed within.

(And so did I throw the dreamy, faraway recollections away, glad it wasn't that painful to do so anymore.)

I skidded to another stop. This time, with a clear destination.

To my left, stood a two-storey house with number 21 stamped on its mail box with curvy, white lines.

_Number 21, Strawberry St., Magnolia City,_ my crumpled memo convinced me.

I took my first step towards the fenceless narrow path towards the door which suddenly burst open noisily.

The next second I knew, my butt had hit hard on the ground as a blur of white and barks and black braids all came at once to my senses.

"How-dee!" A little girl about 4 who I believed had jumped off the tree somehow, yelled with a high-pitched voice as she kneeled on my sprained stomach (ouch), and a little Cihuahua who I later regarded as Plue, licked my cheeks wet.

The toddler grinned brightly, "Welcome home!"

Plue barked happily.

.

.

"Sensei thinks I'm troublesome again today."

He escalated a blond brow, all urges of tease and jokes were erased on the serious note of her tone, before popping a question.

"She said that to you?"

She shook her head, "No, I know so."

"What did you do?"

She played with her fingers, watching as the hem of her skirt shuffled, "...I broke her vase."

There was a slip of silence before came the long awaited, "Why?"

This time, he found her eyes; lost and sad and angry.

"She never scolds me like she does to everyone else."

(Nor ever one dares to laugh at her front either.)

* * *

><p><em>'We wear the mask that grins and lies,<em>

_It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes.'_

_-Paul Laurence Dunbar_

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><p><strong>AN** : Well, that's it! I dunno if my writing is getting rusty, I apologize if it does! ;_;

Reviews are truly treasured :3

p.s : I changed the summary. I know I'm such a derp...

~snowdrop03

_Last edited : December 6, 2012_


	4. Intermission

**A/N** : I edited the previous chapters. You don't have to reread them, because I only added or reduced a few odd sentences and some grammatical errors. Chapter 1 however, was the most tweaked, because with my current writing style, it just wasn't up to my taste. So if you may, just reread that one. Anyway, thank you for your kind reviews, alerts, and faves. Enjoy! :)

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><p><strong>Chapter 4 : Intermission<strong>

.

.

.

**.Lucy.**

I saw Mom and Dad and big brother around a picnic table so stuffy with sandwiches and mouth-watering snacks it was food heaven. Mom's hair was flowing in pretty golden braids, Dad's attire were refreshing polo shirt and casual pants, and big brother's mouth was smeared with chocolate jam that his face looked as ridiculous as one of a clown's. The garden was lush, scented with lilies and clinking cups of teas, with orange curtains of the sunset and laughter eluding.

For a moment I felt like a little kid again, wrapped with child-like innocence and the purest glee even the Santa would be jealous with.

Drawn by the scenery, my insides tugged me to reach out, yet as my fingers touched the breeze, it contorted. Colours and faces began twisting into blurs, whistling wind no more a pleasant melody, and I was harshly draped with dots, then black.

Always black.

I remembered waking up to a wet lapping against my cheek, inside a room that was not mine.

"Plue," a weary eyelid fluttered open as I stretched. The walls seemed dull somehow, I noted. That, or the dream I had was much too colourful, "Mornin'."

More licking, then a hop on my covered lap, tickling my thighs. I stared down groggily, blankets bunching below my sweaty palms. The pink gingham flannel reminded me of checkered picnic tables. And chocolate sandwiches. And an inkling of a picture-perfect family.

My chest tightened.

Plue nudged the palm of my hand, concern worming into his irises. It was a wonder how mutts could sense emotion as easily as the gum under your shoe and the smell of rot in fragrant meadows, as if they were walking detector machines or something. Then again I had no right to talk, seeing I wasn't exactly what a man would call as normal either.

I cracked a grin (_I'm okay_) and it was all it took for the white pup to understand like he always did, for he had wagged a snowy tail then jumped off the bed, head bobbing towards the door, an almost whine and clipping ecstasy in his chatter. I chuckled, and the suffocating weight was lifted somehow.

"Right, food first thing in the morning, eh?" My toes slipped into my bunny-topped slippers, _fluffy_, before a sharp smell wafted into my nostrils and I abruptly inhaled back a yawn I almost choked on.

Was it me or there was something being burned in the house?

The door almost produced a dent right through the wall as it flung open. With no time to even feel slightly apologetic, I trudged through the wooden stairways, feet almost slipping twice in the process as I arrived at the scene area : a chaotic kitchen. All at once, I was overcome by a smell of electrocuted smoke, spreading panic and a hectic exchange of cussing whispers.

"What kind of wise grown-up drowned a smoking toaster—"

"I only splashed the water. _You _smoked the toasts _and_ the toaster."

A boy about my age or a little older, stood across the meal counter, pressing both palms on top his head as if fearing the ceilings would crumble. Rough exasperation tainted his already paling feature, making his shock of pink hair (wow, common genes much?) seemed pinker than it already was. I recalled Asuka mentioning a neighbour with weird rosy hair, was it him by any chance?

"Screw that," he obnoxiously muttered, onyx pools magnifying and horrified, "Your wife's still going to murder us all the same!"

Another one, a ravenette, which I recognized as Alzack, semi-mirrored his expression, only he was putting a finger before his lips. Standing in all his western glory, an empty pail dangled across his abdomen as he stared at the drenched, blackened toaster between them in mash of horror and shame and panic altogether.

"Ssh!" He hushed so loud I thought spit was flying, "You'll wake Lucy up—"

Plue erupted a not-so-silent bark, making all eyes turn and pierce into me in the flash of lightning, and if I didn't know better, I wouldn't like to assume he did it intentionally. Naughty dog.

Simply put, the situation was awkward.

"Uh," I touched the brim of my glasses (thank God I had the instinct to wear it before rushing down), trying to hide behind it as if possible. Heat of embarrassment closed upon the room, and I watched as their gears began turning.

"AH!" They recoiled in unison. I held back a wince for my ears felt like they were ringing.

They screamed frantically, "Please please please don't tell Bisca!"

"...Please don't tell who?" A smooth, cold voice of a woman's resounded, and if it not for the toddler glancing back and forth curiously in her arms, I would have thought she was out to exterminate somebody, preferably the two male species to my front.

The temperature turned zero at once.

Ah, the term 'speak of the devil' seemed really fitting right now.

* * *

><p>If looks could kill, they'd surely be dropped dead by now. Sucked in the eyeballs, spurting blood on the floor, fractured bones, rolling skulls and all...<p>

Okay, that sounded plainly hyperbolic, but you got the picture.

"I was out to the market to get some supplies and _this_ is what I got?"

We were seated on the dining table right after the fiasco. The guy, whose name I later learned was Natsu, squirmed tinier beside me. He stopped playing with his sweaty fingers, ankle swinging and knocking the chair legs. Our feet touched once, but he was so engrossed his nervousness I assumed he didn't even notice. To my front, Alzack considerably shrank too. His unsettled jumpiness made me feel like ducking under the table as if an earthquake was coming.

I gulped and dared a glance towards the questioner whose hands were wrapped in front of her chests. What was she capable of doing it made even males curl so pathetically?

"Someone care to explain?" The young woman coughed, turning her cold dagger to each occupant of the table. Except for little Asuka, of course. The girl peered at us as if we were a part of her favourite cowboy cartoon.

Her bronze eyes landed on me the moment I wished they hadn't, "Lucy?"

"Ah, uh...," I glanced to Natsu, then Alzack. They each gave me a pleading look and I immediately blanked. Why was I dragged into this again? "They at least managed to prevent a...fire?"

If it was a trivia, I was so sure they'd reward me a huge cross right way. Bisca's previous fake smile twitched a little and she shot a dirtier glare to the boys. I sent them a sheepish wave of apology.

"You see," Alzack started, hands still pale and shaking. He was trying to collect back whatever remnants of adult dignity in front of everyone. I found it almost comical, "We originally intended to surprise you with buttered toasts in occasion of welcoming our new family member," he referred to me, "It was Natsu's idea of course. Not mine, just him, not both—"

"But he agreed to it!" Natsu stood up, ticked off, "I mean, I broke the buttons yeah, and it burned just a little longer. But when it started smoking, he just came over screaming and dripping water—"

"The point is, it's the toaster's fault!" The two decided to end. How it happened to be simultaneous was unknown to me.

This particularly ridiculous reason was met with another freezing silent. Asuka knocked her fork on her plate. Plue barked joyfully, again.

Bisca resumed her breakfast.

No one spoke for a handful of minutes.

Two heads bowed onto the table with a bump, "I'm so sorry!" Both pleaded, faces centimeters from their _empty_ plates, with the addition of Alzack exclaiming, "Don't stop cooking my dinner too!"

Bisca quirked a brow as if daring them, dipping a chop of bacon into the home-made BBQ sauce. I must say, I did adore her clean method. After all, it was exactly what they say—a way to a man's heart is through his stomach.

Asuka threw a few circular-cut sausages down her baby stool which Plue gleefully caught in his mouth. She grinned innocently, tomato sauce smearing her cheek, "That shows Daddy's just a bad chef."

_Children are scary_, I decided. They could feign that much innocence to cover insults to their parents, albeit unknowingly?

"Now, now, Daddy is slowly learning, isn't he?" The young mother wiped the toddler's cheek clean, all the while transpiring a warning look towards her husband, "And Natsu, I'll ask your grandma to teach you some basics."

Natsu flailed a bewildered hand, "Uh, no thanks! I can handle it. I better ask myself to learn with," he murmured the last sentence gloomily.

"Lucy, is the food alright?"

I snapped my eyes back up, stunned. A casual table conversation was a rarity to me, "Yes. Thank you."

"Aw, don't be so formal," Bisca grinned warmly. Her long pony-tail swayed from side to side as she slid some breakfast off the frying pan, sparing it for Alzack and Natsu. The two males drooled, "We're living together now, aren't we?"

She was right, yet the fact that I was actually assigned to be a part of a family hadn't really struck onto my brain even until now. They were the guardians Mr. Caprico had arranged me to stay with, seeing that I was not yet in the legal age of private living. As far as I knew, Bisca was one of Mom's distant cousins who came from the West, but then she and her boyfriend Alzack, transferred here for college purposes and eventually got married. Virgo said she visit the mansion once when I was still very little, but I didn't remember much.

"We are," I nodded politely, hiding my discomfort of everyone's sole attention crawling onto me. They meant no harm I knew, but I always hated being in the spotlight, "Thank you," I paused a second, unsure what to call them, "...Uncle and auntie."

Alzack feigned a friendly offence, "You make us sound old. We've told you to call us by names!"

"Then-then," Asuka piped in excitedly, "If Lucy-nee is going to live here, she will be my sister!"

Her query was so honest and pure I couldn't help but smile, "Can I?"

"Uh-huh!" She clapped rowdily. Her chair clattered, "You will tell me bedtime stories and you can be the bad mustache man when I be the cowgirl. And-and, we can braid each other's hair! Oh! We can braid Plue's and Natsu-nii's too!"

Natsu dropped his eating utensils with a clank. Plue raised his head from his bowl, tilting his head as if questioning.

The rest of us broke into a fit of laughter. And for the first time in a long while, the tint of warmth gripping my chest was not somebody else's.

It was mine.

* * *

><p><strong>.Gray.<strong>

I was floating on pillows with the sky as my roof. The lot of them were mounted into giant mattresses of cottons and softness and everything nice I swore I would never gonna wake up.

That was, until a voice flipped them all upside down.

"Gray."

I buried my ears within the folds of my arms. _Can it wait?_

"Oi, Fullbuster, wake up."

I didn't budge, eyes still tightly shut, trying hard to tug the room of pillows back into my peaceful mind, casting the disturbance away from my sleep, whoever it was.

"Gray. Gray. Gray," the voice continued repeatedly. It was getting unbearably deafening by then. I could feel an amount of weight at the top of my head, pressing, squirming and tangling, "Graaaay. Grrray. Grayyy. Gray-chaan—"

"I'm up, I'm up!" I grumbled as I sat up, slapping the hand messing with my hair, my thoughts bleary and vision muddy. I bet my sleepy hair look like one of a hobo's right now.

"Hey there, sleeping beauty," a blurry pale of tan waved in front of my nose. I was guessing it was the hand whose owner I _so_ want dead right now, "Homeroom's over."

I blinked twice, and was immediately graced with the splendid scenery of a classroom. The seats were nearly empty, the board was squeaky clean, and the teacher was gone. A couple of students was exiting the door, chattering their lives away.

_Oh_, my drowsy, slowpoke of a brain finally caught up.

"You never cease to disgust me, Loke," I pulled my seat and gripped my black backpack, one strap over my shoulder. Really, flirting with girls was one thing, but calling a guy a beauty?

I scratched my hair, suppressing any urge to plop onto another chair to doze off , "Was I really out that long?

"Nah," Loke's comeback was dipped in sarcasm, "_Only_ an hour or so."

I looked to my left and right, sorting through the sea of students cramped in the hall. A few seniors clad in Jerseys bumped into nearly everyone in their attempt of slipping through. A group of girls leaned against their lockers, chatting in high-pitch little giggles with skirts shortened so high I doubt they ever intent to wear any, _at all_. They stopped their act when our eyes met, waving cheerily. Loke gave them a flirty salute.

I rolled my eyes, "Where's Natsu?"

Loke almost backtracked in his steps. I was glad he didn't though, for if he really did, he'd most likely be steered by the tides of human. Or trampled in between and squished for his dear life. The corridor was _that_ busy.

"You really _did_ nap through homeroom," he stated with so much incredulity I almost didn't believe it myself.

I gave him a scoff, pocketing my palms on habit, "Thanks for the highlight."

"Natsu's giving the new transfer a tour," he answered, ignoring my last comment.

This time, it was me who almost tripped backwards, "Transfer? To our class?" _I really slept over that?_

"Yup. Lucky guy he is, the girl's a cutie," his eyes glinted beneath coloured glasses, "Though a different kind of cute, I guess."

Typical Loke, always the ladies man. I wouldn't be surprised if he had a detailed list of each type of woman in the universe pasted in his locker to check every morning. I weighed the idea for a while. Maybe _that_ was the polish of his daily pick-up lines. For real.

"How's your Saturday?" The strawberry blonde asked conversationally, entering codes into his locker. He was leaning fully against its frame, so I couldn't check if there really was a list taped inside.

He was referring to my dinner with Ultear, but I couldn't help but be reminded of...some other occurrence that day. I bit back a smile, "Same old."

Loke must have noticed something, for he peeked at me suspiciously, "Oh really now?"

I hummed, snapping my locker close with a 'thunk', taking out my Bio textbook, "Oh really."

The boy narrowed his eyes as if I was a horrible lab experiment.

"I'm assuming pray tell doesn't work then?"

"Nope," I made the 'p' pop, just for the sake of aggravating him more.

This was a guessing game we had been playing ever since we first met. I did something out of my line of normality, he sniffed something was up. It was how our friendship worked—we never asked and we seldom tell, and even if we did, both of us would likely end up dropping vague hints we knew the other could pick up. Loke was good at disguising inner intents, but I was an expert at hiding them, an aspect so similar yet actually differed much. Having the slightest idea of how our gears span and ran, we would try to crack every layer of forts that was each other's mind, figuring out what was the core resting inside.

Most of the time though, we'd fire up the little challenge to our taste.

"Bet you ten Jewels I'm gonna find out," Loke tapped my shoulder with a smirk.

I smiled confidently, hitting my pants pocket for emphasize, "Bet another twenty that you won't."

After all, an encounter with an odd boy who had never eaten any hot dog was pretty much unimaginable even to the most creatives, wasn't it?

* * *

><p><em>'All the statistics in the world can't measure the warmth of a smile.'<em>

_—Chris Hart_

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><p><strong>AN** : Review please? :)


	5. Conspiracy?

**A/N** : Sorry for making you wait, again. School just won't get any busier. Oh _wait_, it just did...

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 5 : Conspiracy?<strong>

**.**

**.**

**.**

**.Lucy.**

Natsu was a bouncing ball of energy, I concluded, so much that he could have passed as a kid monkey.

His moving pace was rambunctious—part jogging, part hopping, and very _little _walking though I was pretty sure we were about a good twenty minutes away from class starting. Sometimes, he'd walk backwards—facing me with his wide toothy grin—towards the front, but still managed to turn at each junction with the perfect angle that he never bumped into a standing lamp post or any house fences. It caused me to take a silly notion if he happened to own a second pair of eyes at the back of his head.

Or it turned out that he might just have a second set of vocal cords planted deep within the wall of his throat instead.

"About ten houses away is Magnolia Park," he announced, pointing straight to the northeast, "...where the Rainbow Sakura Tree is in full bloom," his attention shifted to the eastern side of the road, then a few buildings on the south, then the street junction of the southwest (and every other direction there was) as he explained excitedly, boisterously, and endlessly, "To the right is the market. Oh! And there's the pool. A cool place for summer, really. Then the shopping district—Oh, morning birds! Searching for morning worms, I bet! Anyway then—"

"Onii-san," a voice interjected, laughter slipping within its scolding wake, "Slow down."

And he did, though the action nearly made no difference either. A slight improvement from two words per second to one each.

It was fortunate that the boy's little sister hadn't inherited the same portion of jumping, hopping, scrambling, barely-contained stamina, for I wouldn't know how to handle two clashing spurs of hyperactivity. Funny how Wendy was his exact polar opposite; a reserved, polite girl in exchange of a loud and obnoxious boy and long blue strands rather than spiky bubble-gum pink.

Wendy must have caught my perturbed stare, for she regarded me with a sheepish smile.

"Sorry about that, Lucy-san," she referred to her supposedly older sibling, "My brother is what you call...born-energetic."

I watched as his blabbering continued on, oblivious that none of us had really heard him anymore. There was a lilt of excitement in his black eyes, genuine, almost childlike, as if he was sincerely happy to have another companion in his simple trip to school.

He was like a spirited kid trapped in a body of a maturing teenager.

"Nah, it's okay," a sudden gall made me roll my eyes, "As long as my ears succeed to keep up."

Wendy laughed.

"Wen!" A boy called out in the distance, an outline of neat black hair, red vest, yellow scarf and white grin, "Hurry, hurry, we're up for morning duty!"

"Coming!" Wendy replied, chocolate eyes twinkling. She turned to us, face alight, "I'll be off then!"

She was off in a flash then, a light skip in her run and extra thumps in her heart. A taste of cotton candy melted inside my mouth, as sweet and fluffy as an innocent crush. I tried to suppress a little grin when the boy tugged on her ponytail with a smirk, more as a tease than a bully.

"He's Romeo," Natsu gave him a wave, a moment before they disappeared in the corner we sooner would walked to had we followed the retreating two's pace, "A great kid. He's been Wendy's classmate since like, third grade, I think," he brought his arms behind his head in a carefree manner, "His father is one of our teachers."

"Ah," I nodded, unsure how to pop the nagging question in the pit of my mind, but gave it a shot anyway, "Is it fun?"

Natsu dropped his hands, "Huh?"

I felt like the most idiotic person in the world somehow, "The school, I mean."

At first, I had mistaken the lack of words and the tickling in my guts as his urge to guffaw at me, but he grinned instead—not out of ridicule, not judging or degrading, but out of excitement and pride—then bobbed his head to the front.

"See for yourself."

Without realizing, we had in fact, arrived at the path which Wendy and Romeo had dissipated into.

The first thing I saw was a gate—a row of slender metal poles with black paint that seemed to crack here and there—pushed aside halfway onto the creamy brick wall. Beyond it, a wide building of pastel colouration stood, topped with glistening rails of the rooftop, a big analogue clock of what many schools would own, and surrounded with a length of lined sport field and a row of various green shrubberies and trees nearing the inner and outer entrance. The school insignia shone proudly in the center of a metallic shield-a weird creature in orange with a fat snout and a pointy tail. The place itself wasn't even extravagant or glamorous, there were no majestic sculptures enraptured or a fountain made of pretty marbles in sight.

It was weird how the whole simplicity comforted me in a way.

"Welcome to Fairy Academy," I barely felt Natsu propping his elbow over my shoulder, a proud smile in his voice, "Lucy Connell."

* * *

><p>I readied a mental shield the moment we came out the principal's office.<p>

The principal was a late-aged man, with short figure and white beard of an elf's. His cheeks wrinkled as he grinned merrily and his experienced eyes spoke of countless extracted knowledge. He was very welcoming—he explained the bit of rules I had to keep in mind and handed me my schedule and locker number—alike a father to his child coming home, but didn't have to fake any overly-strict, frowny attitude many principals would in order for him to be respected. I would just pretend I never knew that the stack of suspicious magazines jutting out of his drawers wasn't there for students' restrain purpose alone, though.

"Come on," Natsu's voice was a split of white noise beneath the others that I had to loosen my personal bubble by a brick to simply open my ears and listen. He tugged at my wrist lightly, dragging me in a nearly zigzaging pattern as I swallowed back a repetition of apology to every bumping shoulder, "Our homeroom teacher has an evil knack of punishing tardy kids!"

The corridor was a mass of emotional torture in my case, spanning wildly from arousing panic of arriving a late to class, typical morning laziness and hesitance to involve one's self with the tedious education, excitement of meeting the friends they'd actually also met the previous week, the spurs of all teenage dilemmas and forgotten homework, or simply an abstain to all care in the world (oh what I would not give to forever feel the latter).

That was why when the bell rang and the crowd lessened, I was all gratefulness and relief wrapped into one rather than the cussing mess that was Natsu Dragneel.

Ironically, the long ring ended the moment we stopped at the right door. Natsu's tone turned serious then, an expression I never expected him of all people would show.

"Lucy, trust me that I've got your back," he squeezed my shoulder, grip ferocious and posture determined, "But if ever I don't survive the punishment, please tell Wendy that she can find my will in—"

I held out the tiny memo kept inside my skirt pocket and gave him the blandest stare I could manage.

"Oh!" As he gawked in a hyperbolic manner, I inwardly sighed. Could this boy be anymore clueless?

The door snapped open with the nudge of his shoe. He gave me a cheery thumb up, almost cocky, "Watch me."

I rolled my eyes the umpteenth time that day.

"Yo!" His unceremonious entrance went, topping the already-noisy class resonantly. Many waved him good morning. The other kept on blabbering like they heard nothing. This strange condition startled me a little. Sure, it had been a while since I stepped into a real school, but weren't students in classes supposed to be silent and orderly?

Right after I wondered where in the world the teacher was, a man I had first thought was a gypsy in messy formal of some sorts peeked from his newspapers. His orange, wavy hair was partly tied to the back, his chin was poorly shaved and a gray tie was loosened around his neck. A thin stick of tobacco hung between his lips. By the lacking of smoke, I figured it was unlit.

He folded his paper into roll and whacked Natsu on the head. Hard, and it was thick too.

The boy whined pitifully, "What was that for?"

"Lousy manners, lousy entrance, lousy _uniform_," the man flicked his finger with each penalty mentioned, then smirked. A thin line of mischief and unspoken desire of (dark) punishment, "Oh never mind that. I'll give you ten seconds of reasoning your tardy before—"

"Actually," Natsu waved the memo I'd handed him right in front of the man's nose, wiggling it proudly, "I got a permission slip from Jii-chan himself."

He examined the paper, scrunching his nose as if deciding if it was some poor prank of signature forgery but then saw me leaning slightly against the door frame and blinked.

He smirked.

"Come on in then, transfer."

* * *

><p>Classes dragged on, even on first days. The existence of that aspect I knew was always a constant.<p>

Like strained crouching turtles, like sluggish snails on their slimy marathon, the periods crawled from homeroom (which practically consisted of with my brief introduction, free time for us students and newspaper time for Clive-sensei) to Humanity to Biology with such crammed, lecture-filled, homework-assigned pace I had to endure each and every ounce of myself not to bury my head into my lengthy sleeves due to the extremity of muffled sleepiness or newly achieved pressure of unusuality. I briefly wondered if it was because of my brains corroding to the new routine of being trapped in a room full of curious stares and snark whispers masked with a reluctant sense of attentiveness even the teachers could figure out. Maybe it had something to do with the rarity of transfers in mid-May, or my necktie being tightened too high, or my glasses too thick, or my pigtails way too shady or nerdy to their taste. But somehow, it didn't even matter anymore that my purposely plain appearance did nothing to immerse myself within the crowd but had acted out the opposite impact.

I snuffed out my sixth yawn of the day.

Turned out that I was just bored. Simply so very bored.

Natsu was off to Physics and Levy (the friendly class representative who somehow insisted she should tour me rather than Natsu) was having Chemistry, so I was practically alone with no one else I really recognize, or be entertained with. The relieving factor that I was sitting by the sunny window was not even enough, for not only I had already learned about the skin and core of Taxonomy from Caprico-sensei just a couple of months ago, old Eugene-sensei's unenthusiastic teaching was the flattest croaky baritone that could miraculously tugged your eyelids, along with the spell of squeaking marker on slick white board and repetitive implying that 'fungi was not a plant'(maybe he had a periodic dementia or something, with his assuming that we could forget about the fact simply after _every_ twenty minutes). Most of the class seemed to share this opinion, for when their who-the-heck-is-the new-student fad finally had died down, I could no longer see most of their heads poking upright anymore, meaning : they had dropped dead and kissed their desks in the deepest of slumbers. I for one, would have been very pleased joined them, if the wrinkly teacher hadn't sent me jolting in and out my drowsiness by asking what my name was every chance he (for)got.

Small wonder if the whole class had gotten sick at the sound of my name right about then.

I propped my cheeks, arm and elbow acting as a steady pole to the wobbling shamble that was my concentration that refused to simply burst into sleep. My hand seemed to recognize this syndrome for it had ceased whatever undoubtedly misspelled notes my pencil was writing and had resorted into patterns of random circles and curvy mess of lines. Half-sleep always presented the stragest reaction to one's mind and tended to mentally mix what you vaguely hear or see, so I wasn't surprised that the scratches had turned into doodles and doodles into a face and the face into a frog-dissecting Eugene-sensei...with a giant spotty fungi for a hat.

I would have been reduced to laughter at the ridicule that was now on my notes, had not I heard a snort I was perfectly sure wasn't mine.

And I saw him, cursing myself why I hadn't, earlier.

My seatmate, previously napping, now awake. My seatmate, whose face previously hidden between nook of arms, looking as if he was going explode with amusement any second. My _seatmate, _with tousled locks of raven I hadn't clarified, and the after taste of hot dogs and quirky laughter as well as the one and only possible eye-to-eye witness of my cross-dressing disguise, sitting inches to my right like it was arranged so _normally_, and I did not. Even. Notice.

This was certainly a cruel conspiracy.

* * *

><p><strong>.Gray.<strong>

Incidentally, Biology had nominated itself onto the very peak of my top favourite subject.

(Though rather than 'favourite', 'tolerated' would be much more fitting, because really, there never was such term as a favourited aspect of school.)

Not that I had the label of science geek pasted with giant fonts on my forehead. Scientific inclination after all, did not mean that I should be a crazy scientist wanna-be prancing around on high with a sharpened scalpel and a dried, dead frog in hand. That would just be sick. And even more disturbing, if I engaged said depiction with the ever as-happy-as-a-rock old Eugene.

A bit laughable, still.

At least in this class, I wasn't the only one disconnecting myself off the world. With the lengthy, wide laboratory table, pillowed spinning seat, and a teacher who seemed to hold tightly onto the illusion that 'as long as one got their mouth zipped, their ears were definitely open', no one would give the slightest damn even if we circulated a packet of popping bubblegum around or stuffed our ears with flashy, blaring headsets as long as we shut up.

Or dare say, taking a nap so blatantly.

At least, almost.

But that strangely did not matter, for everything that was worth, Biology right then mainly meant no certain strawberry blond going all hawk eyes on me and boring holes through my head behind his deceptive mask of subtle disinterested side glances even when I tried/pretended to sleep. Granted, the astrology freak took space science. Something about how absolutely romantic the stars were, he winked, and I never cared to clarify if it was the cheesy pick-up line of the day to gross me out or if he was actually telling the truth, though it wouldn't be that surprising if it were to be both. I got the same feeling this time when he didn't bother the decency to compress his much too enthused curiousity unlike he usually did with our previous little bets. Either that he discovered something thoroughly interesting that render his observation strangely fiercer or that he had purposely done it to get me spit up something, crack anything of a clue that would lead him into figuring out much, much easier. And quicker. Then again, knowing Loke, it could be both. He was annoying like that.

It was bizarre that I would prefer flame head anytime in this case. At least, if it wasn't something painfully obvious, Natsu would play the dumb part, and the interrogation tended to come later.

I couldn't remember if I fell asleep in the end, but when I came to, the air around me was thin with scribbling pencil. Weird, because it was rare for high school students to jot with pencils, let alone jot _any_ in Bio. It usually only involved those real science geeks that came to class early and took a grand seat at the very front, writing as if their lives depended on the lecture, that if they missed even one word, they would suffocate miserably on the lack of information, or something like that. It was not like pencils had been discriminated into a child's stationary either. Many still brought mechanical pencils, yes. Graphite pencils? Not really, unless it was those art students we were talking about.

It was then I realized that someone was sitting beside me, either I wasn't aware because I attempted to "disconnect" as soon as I had arrived on my seat, or that I had forgotten altogether. I had never seen her around before though—a girl with blonde hair neatly bunched to the front. A pair of thick-rimmed glasses rested on her petite nose and by the way she was lazily propping her chin and the direction her graphite pencil was moving, I knew she wasn't writing. This in itself was a contradiction. In physical term, this girl was practically screaming "nerd" with her tight tie and thick lenses, but in the other hand she was sitting on the back instead of gluing herself to the whiteboard and was practically doodling shamelessly instead of well, _listening_.

All assumption was lost in a hurricane anyway, as I caught glimpse of her so-called doodle.

It was a caricature, the big head said it all. The subject was truly recognizable, wrinkles folding his face so accurately it looked real. Squinty steely eyes, a big nose, thick olden brows, and shiny baldy head, though instead of being bare there was a mushroom growing on its top like his skull was acting as smooth soil. His expression was flat, singed with just a little bit of craze, and he was holding a dead dried frog and a scalpel—

I must have vocalized my disbelieved choke for the blonde had halted her shading, looking at me as if I had burnt my pants. The silence was pregnant for another few seconds until atmosphere shifted from shock to awkward to expectant.

"Sorry," I blurted, encased with the absurdity of my act that in a stranger's view literally spoke different degrees of 'creepy', "It's not like— I mean, uh—"

"Mr. Thirstbuster!" I cooped back a groan, "And you, miss over there, what's your name?"

A heavy sigh, "Lucy Conell, sir."

"Are you two aware of the significance of classification? Are _you?_" Eugene scrunched his nose so irately to a level one was incapable of. Of course we did. The answer was so huge on the board titled with 'Benefits of Taxonomy' even anyone on the last row could see. Fortunately, the girl too seemed to think that it was best not being a know-it-all in this issue. Unless, someone wanted a reward of after school essay...

"As I thought," I swore old man just looked so very smug. A pen into his nostril would be a fine specimen, maybe? "Listen and keep your voices down, would you?"

And he continued, in the sort of way that nothing had happened. The class seemed unfroze with this motion, back into blaring music and passing bubblegum and silent pens. It tingled a little with the intensity of the girls' glare though.

Hating to owe any form of guilt, I opened my mouth to further apologize, but the girl (what was her name again? Lucy?) had already appointed a lazy gaze towards the window as if any more matter was simply dismissed. I shouldn't have bothered, and acting on a base of simple curiousity wasn't really my trait (it was Loke's through and through), but something about the girl bugged me like a sore thumb I couldn't pinpoint. Weird, different, but familiar.

Before my mind could run else where, I wrote "**Sorry**" between the lines of my notebook and passed it to our through the long table with a swish. As if broken from a trance, the blonde blinked in surprise.

(Oddly that too, felt familiar.)

She observed my face for a while, back to the book, then back to me with a single raised brow and expression so bland that got me feeling so very utterly stupid.

Too late to back down, I wrote more.

**For laughing.**

She stared at me, still. I gulped.

**For snooping into your notes too, I guess.**

Lucy shook her head (out of...amusement? Exasperation?), pigtails shaking slightly in every other way, then scribbled on her own notes, directly below her doodle.

**It's fine.**

Two words. Short, neat, curved, but that was that. I didn't even know what I was expecting either. A request for a phone number? Gushes and flattery giggles and pink blushes? I wasn't around girls much, and the ones I was constantly with were one who would point a kitchen knife if I so much as strip my t-shirt and the other one had a hobby of harassing little brother (cough, Mom and Ultear). The rest were the epitomes of rabid fan girls.

It seemed rude to keep the conversation hanging (or was it not? I didn't really know), so I continued anyway.

**Great drawing though.**

Lucy's eyes widened minimally as she read, then reread. Her complexion was pieces and bits of puzzle. Shifting, arranging, and suppressing so fast I couldn't keep up.

**You think so?**

**It is funny. And appropriate.—**On second thought, I scratched the latter with a cringe. Where had that word came from again?—**I wouldn't find anyone else who can copy his wrinkles so perfectly. And nice mushroom too?**

There was a twitch nudging her lips. Almost a smile, but not quite. Then it was gone.

**You have your way with words, Thirstbuster.**

I flushed. Hey, I was being rarely honest here! **Deal with it. And it's Fullbuster.**

**Not any much different.**

The conversation was pretty much dead after that, simply because neither of us knew what else to say. Or maybe it had got something to do with the ever so ominous glare the girls were sending. It was about five to ten minutes later that the bell rang and the students scrambled noisily with their bags. Lucy's table was one of the firsts to be empty, so I assume as I stood to my feet that she had left.

She hadn't. It seemed doubtful, and so so abrupt, but when our gaze met before leaving, she bowed. There were no distaste, no estrange, no adoring in her eyes, simply a steady acknowledgement. She didn't look away either.

I didn't know what expression I was wearing, because the moment Loke and I met up in the hallways later, he was giving me the same kind of particular look as this morning and was resuming, or possibly, re-positioning his hawk-like stance.

Not that I mind as much, for I was bloating on the proud fact that albeit only for a half period, it was my first time being awake and kicking on Bio.

For whatever reason, it felt rather...nice.

* * *

><p><em>"Sometimes there is such beauty in awkwardness. There's love and emotion trying to express itself, but at the time, it just ends up being awkward." <em>  
><em>― Ruta Sepetys, Between Shades of Gray<em>

* * *

><p><strong>AN** : I hope their relationship doesn't shift too fast? It's not that they're already in love or something though. At least, not yet :)

Anyway, the ratio between the alerts and reviews frustrates me a little, where in the world are your voices people?

*cough*

Thanks for reading anyways :)

(Reviews are love, still.)

~snowdrop03


	6. Schoolmates

**A/N** : I had difficulty on the last part, dunno why, which was why this chapter came out later than I intended. I'm terrible I know, sorry ;_;

Anyway, big thanks to reviewers, new followers, and those of you who favourited. As always, they mean a bunch!

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><p><strong>Chapter 6 : Schoolmates<strong>

**.**

**.**

**.**

**.Lucy.**

"Behold, the bestest hang-out spot of the campus! Pe-ri-od."

Levy's gleeful bellow seemed to hop from one rickety shelf to another ten, shuffling with the echoes of floor boards creaking as we stepped in. Books of different thickness and jacket were stacked up randomly like rows of sandwiches inside vertical picnic baskets. The room was nearly what I interpreted as the insides of a tree house, almost old looking and wholy wooden inside out. Even said material was powdered within the smell. Except, the space was rather enormous, filled with a few set of tables and chairs and shelves, and was not placed on some tree branches, obviously.

"Shouldn't a library hold the policy of silence or something?" I murmured lowly. My eyes roamed to an L-shaped desk in the corner, sporting two equally aged CRT monitors and a messy pile of worn-out folders.

"You talk funny," the blunette grinned, flailing her arms up and about, left and right, "What's the meaning of silence if there's no one to shush us into it?"

A certain noisy pink-haired boy somehow popped inside my head.

"Not you too, Levy-chan," my suspicion was proved correct when Lisanna wryly released a defeated sigh, "I've had enough of a loud Natsu in one day. Tell me he's not rubbing anything on you."

Levy's nose flared up.

"Do not speak more of that poor disgrace of literature!" She fumed pointedly. It was apparent in our short encounter that Levy was as much as a bookworm as I was (though she was much more extreme in some ways), shown by the shoots of question whirring on favourite genres and authors and writing whatnots the moment she discovered my appreciation of them. Lisanna was first introduced to me then—a girl with pixie-cut hair and vibrant blue eyes. Seeing that she had no comment on the whimsical act (of cornering a new student and interrogating them like a literature police), I could safely suppose that they were close friends.

Then there was Natsu, who had stayed during our little tour of the academy, off-handedly prompting that the only piece of writing he had ever devoured had been Wendy's super secret diary and that one porn magazine someone called Loke had flashed him another day. That, in a mini-scaled way of saying, had set Levy off. Had not the pinkette own the littlest perfect sense of emergency escape, it would be no surprise if the petite girl had done something uncharacteristically violent while giving him more earful definition of what a genuine composition should mean, which obviously was not—quote, unquote—rummaging a girl's secret heart's content or some hormonal issues poured into ero wordings and close-up pictures of jiggling butts that was not even worth a decent skimming.

"Besides," as if all fury was washed clean, a sudden a epiphany got Levy wiggling her brows, "We all know you won't ever have enough of him, eh 'Sanna-chan?"

Lisanna flushed brightly, "Levy-chan!" Her lips quirked and hung in a spur of working up a better come-back. Failing, she finally resorted to, "Now where is that novel I found the other day...?" with an overly laid-back voice and settled into the furthest rack of the room.

"How smooth," I heard Levy muttered in between spluttering muffled giggles. She waved a hand at me, "Feel free to look around then, Lu-chan!"

The nickname tickled. It tinged my skin and lingered eerily, probably because how so very foreign it had sounded rather plain old Lucy or the ever so stiff Lucia. A kind of endearment of what I imagined a friend would present. Maybe. It was not a case as easy though, I quickly corrected my delusional assessment. Because as much as I could read a heart, a feeling itself veiled a core named "reason" that was as opaque to me as it did anyone else. Malicious reasons were so ominous and foul and dark they were easier to mix with feelings and as easier to sense, but it didn't make them any simpler to decipher. The girls' friendliness was both genuine and kind, but their acts might only be based on simple courtesy of classmates, or a willing class rep's duty, or even a personality of a busy-body. Never once it necessarily meant a craving hand of friendship. The same went with the Conell's, also Natsu and Wendy, and that weird boy with exhibiting tendencies.

It was the most I was able to deserve, I decided.

The shelf I explored reminded me of an old woman's crooked set of teeth. It wasn't as full as it seemed at first glance, and gaps of one or two stood crookedly between a couple of leaning novels. I pulled out one of the neatly stacked—turquoise, hard-covered with black lining and unrecognizable title—then flipped it open. Dust coiled to multiple directions within the yellowish pages, miniscule of itchy fireflies under the dispersing sunlight that got my throat dried and my nose twitching so bad.

"We haven't got into sorting this section yet," Levy dropped a pile of leather, glossy, and carton covered novels, picking and lining them up into the shelf beside mine with gentle care. They were less dusty, and was organized under a rusty tag engraving a cursive _Fantasy_. Hands full, she shrugged one shoulder sheepishly, "It was way worse when we first came in though. This room was probably an ancient storage more than anything."

"Junior high's library is separated so we don't know much," Lisanna added, flipping through a heap of her own on a table nearby, a bristle brush in hand and even more dust flying through the pages wiped, "But it's said there haven't been any more book arrival since long ago," a light sneeze chipped in, "And old fads are old fads. Automatically, the students' reading rate takes a very low blow."

I plopped my book close, "The librarian?"

"Peachy," at this, both girls snorted, "She handed us the keys without second mind, said we could do anything we wanted with it."

I raised a brow. Seriously? "Any other...visitor?"

The two shook their heads in exasperation.

"It's not like we're aiming anyone into being an avid reader though," tiptoe-ing, the petite blunette barely reached the second top rack. Then a sigh, "but if only for a little, someone is intrigued to take a peek, to have the littlest appreciation of all _these_," fingers tracing over the shelves, the blunette gave out a sad kind of fond smile, "...of these enchanting worlds the authors created, it will be truly _truly_ great."

Her pitch alone had spoken then. Dipped with pure enthusiasm, akin to foretelling a secret chamber full of precious treasury, an undying passion of something so simple, only so that other people's sake would not be forgotten. Trials, hopes, and invitations shoved in the face with mocks and weird looks and insulting rejections for a problem that was originally would have not been her own.

"Then you need not only an avid reader," my words poured before I could stop myself. I looked at her in the eye, "Gather a team whatsoever, scout an attention grabber, broadcast your purposes, _attract_."

Lisanna's gasp hitched the silence, "With wider connection, we can find a way to collect profit!"

"And purchase improvements!" Levy's hand shook and pumped in excitement.

"Find out why the supplies are lacking..."

"Problem solved and we can gain more readers."

"A book club," I couldn't help but smile, their spirit stirring turbulence in my guts in a nice weird way.

Both heads suddenly snapped at me that I was surprised their necks hadn't cracked. There was something shimmering in their eyes, vibrant with respect and somewhat shining with bright scheming.

My spines chilled as Levy grinned.

Two arms circled each of mine before I could protest, and in the speed of lightning and a blur of 'huh?' and an unwrapped mind, we were out in the corridors.

* * *

><p><strong>.Gray.<strong>

"You _are_ kidding."

Another set of snickers rallied. So loud, so plenty, so very amused at my shame-for-life expense I half-hoped the wind would pick up and swallow them all.

"Given the circumstances," I narrowed my eyes, voice tight with sarcasm and every inch of irk I could muster to express, "Have I ever?"

The possible horror in my face was proved to be humorous, for Loke had clutched his stomach for dearest life and was in a mid-way into sprawling cross-legged. This was a side Loke Stellar had let loose to very few people. After all, the phenomenal playboy insisted in staying true to his reputation agenda within the female population and 'eloquence' was his so-called number one word.

As _if_. I was only glad that he had—if only for a while—forgotten about the bet.

Straightening up, he wiped a tear, "Imagine your face back then—"

"Don't _even._"

"—cornered by a mad lady in her thirties, slapped in the face for cowering from an implicitly romantic dinner date—"

"He did what?"

Natsu stood by the rooftop door, rustling packs of spicy buns spilling beneath his arms, tone glimmering from confusion to disbelief to chocked snorts. Jellal followed behind with a more composed reaction, his blown bubblegum shrinking for a second before popping.

"My sister," I quickly supplied before the two worded their certainly weird assumptions, "hacked my phone on our dinner, sent an inviting text to the cashier of the restaurant whose number she somehow 'mysteriously' acquired, and when I set everything straight to her..." I cringed upon the recollection of the angry mob of a woman and her bristled shouts and _how dare you toy a lonely woman's feelings_, "Yeah, you heard the rest."

Settling a seat the opposite, Natsu noisily tore one plastic pack of his many mini lunches and munched into the reddish bread with as much vigor. This barbaric display was no more an oddity, it was his choice of favourite food and the portion of which he consumed it that always got me wondering.

"And here-_bite_-I thought that ice brain's over the phase of gender confusion-_munchmunch_-Turns out you're still gay all the same."

Could I add that he spoke ten times more irritatingly as he mumbled between grinding and spewing food?

Loke mockingly gasped, moving a little distance from mine to imply, "You don't happen to dig me, do you?"

I threw the stupid Natsu my (luckily for him, empty) cola bottle, and jabbed the equally crazy Loke on the side. Once upon a time, there was a pinkette whose concept of "gender attraction" had been as blank as white paper. Unfortunately, a certain perverted flirt came along, and it was long unspoken, of what resources and to what extent the latter had fed/tainted the former.

"At least you got a chance to mingle with an X chromosome," beside me, Jellal quipped with the littlest of smile, still chewing his sweets. It was a miracle they hadn't caused any fatal cavity, given how frequent he chomped on them.

"Might say the same thing about yourself," I rolled my eyes and leaned against the wall behind—its grainy texture a weird comfort against my back—promptly ignoring the other two's chortles, "Always papers before girls, huh Mr. Vice Prez?"

"Naive, naive little Gray," Loke, alerted as always, stopped laughing and clicked his tongue, voice dictating as if talking to a retarded child, "They may seem strictly professional on the outside, but what happens with them behind closed doors?" He shook his head with a sneaky smirk, "Nobody really knows."

Jellal pulled another strip of Lotte gum, "Isn't it not yours to concern," aloof and calm with a trace of something barely audible, he side-glanced with a grin that might have implied something else, "Kouhai."

Our jaws flapped open. There was a sound akin to choking and hyperventilating altogether which faintly belonged to Natsu and his cursed crumbs of lunch.

Call us exaggerating, but any other girl's name would not initiate such an immense bomb of shock. It was after all _the_ Erza Scarlet he was talking about. The strict student council president with hot iron as fists and sharpened swords as eyes no one dared not meet. She brought the typical school rule book one would most likely toss in between junks or recycled as paper plane material, could sniff out Natsu's ingenious pranks with an ease of a Siberian Husky and even rewarded Loke's casual flirting with a traumatic threat of castration the boy was wise enough to believe in. As far as nonsensical rumors go, her longer duration in the council's room than other staffs provides her just the perfect time to arrange an evil plot against the students, and more often than not they assumed that Jellal who stayed with her the most often had been tainted as her accomplice. Though the latter only claimed that she dumped him a monstrous ton of work was all.

"_Senpai_," In matter of seconds, Loke had crawled in a spider-like speed to the blue-haired boy and clasped both his hands in a devoted manner. A light beyond admiration glinting in his forest eyes so bright I wanted to laugh and puke at the same time, "Please grant me your divine knowledge."

"Reminds me," without even shifting from his position, Jellal slid the topic like a well-baited fishing rod, "How's the new transfer?"

Typical. Evading the conversation by replacing a girl topic with another girl topic. Such a bummer too, I was curious all the same, but knowing the quiet Jellal, he would probably zip his mouth and not utter a word if he pleased. Still, as obsessive as Loke might be with wooing every girl in the inch of universe, surely he wouldn't be such a thick head to hold onto the fat worm—

The strawberry blond turned to Natsu so immediately like a starved animal.

—Scratch that. I forgot he was an idiot.

"Huh?" Natsu said through muffled voice, his interest once again piqued, sauce spoiling as he grinned, "She's cool."

Be it out of pure curiosity or that a certain blonde just so happened to appear in my head, the question escaped my mouth before I could swallow it back, "Is her name Lucy or something?"

Natsu looked at me dumbly, sincere bewilderment splattered across his face, "Of course it's Lucy, dummy. Not '_something_'," but didn't question it.

Loke on the other hand raised a brow, surprised, "Whoa, met her already?"

"...Heard a couple of kids mentioned it," I shrugged for good measures. Not that I was _fully_ lying, I thought after, but somehow it was a good enough answer rather than elaborating that we were coincidentally on the same course. Or why I even noticed she was there because I nearly was never awake for said lesson in the first place. _Or_ the unnecessary explanation that followed, including that she had been sitting in Juvia's seat instead of the owner herself...

...Which brought me the late realization that the girl was absent.

"This Lucy...," Jellal spoke before I could rise the topic up, "She has blonde pigtails and thick glasses?"

I reminded myself not to nod as Natsu answered, "Yeah, what of it?"

The blue-haired boy paused for a while, as if recollecting his words, but then his smile was tweaked with what could be distinguished as light amusement.

"I saw her with Lisanna and her friend rushing into the Student Council room."

Silence lingered for three long beats before Natsu choked the second time that day.

* * *

><p><strong>.Lucy.<strong>

"Mind telling me what you're barging in for?"

The room was a deafening state of quiet as the steep voice inquired. The tone lingered, the only plastic clock of the domain ticked like falling steps, papers among papers being scribbled on with sharp lead like shrieks on a ripping fabric, and I nearly cursed at the hitching staccato that was my light intakes. Or Levy's and Lisanna's. I didn't know, but anyone could easily take notice that within the silent walls of the room, we sounded like a pack parched puppies. Funny that we were not even panting _that_ hard.

The previously sole occupant of the room didn't stir her position. Her back remained hunched and concentrated with the mounts of files and brown paper envelopes, neck poised downwards in a posture that scream automatic to many. Not stiff, but accumulated in habits and routines. The girl did not say another word, but the air reeked of waits and a tidbit of annoyance and nervousness, tinted with confusion in every other edge.

A grain of said puzzled annoyance was definitely mine.

I sent what hopefully was a dirty glare to the two girls that had not so subtly snatched my arm, dragged me for several yards around the corridor then unceremoniously pushed me to a room we were currently in for reasons I could not name. I could tell the last part was uncalled for though, because they were fidgeting in their stillness with sheepish smiles. I got a feeling that one of us tripped and bumped to the doorway when another was knocking as a boy came out.

"Well?" A clicking of pen strutted. Face to face with a long desk in between, were maroon strands cascading a sharp jaw and biting eyes in the colour of cinnamon so intense as if they favoured to cut anyone in half.

It was no wonder that anyone would think twice to answer. Scary prez, I heard them murmur a few times on our way. Levy nudged Lisanna. The latter jabbed back. It went for a couple more ridiculous seconds before Lisanna, finally giving in, spoke in an almost curt voice.

"Sorry for disturbing you, kaichou...?" The apology came in half a question, half a doubt, "We...um," an awkward smile, "need a permission to establish a club."

Her nod seemed airy. Dry of response but attentive. A gesture to continue.

"A book club to be exact!" The neutral reply seemed to have boosted Levy's spirit, "You sure have heard of the abandoned library of the second floor?"

"I might have," her answer came out as rigid, but I knew it contained a spark of interest, "If you are talking about an old room next to Language Arts?"

We nodded.

"What about it?"

"We are planning to renew it. You know, probably supply it with popular classics, splash a little colour here and there...," Levy's enthused plan trailed off as she stared back into the redhead's unblinking orbs.

"Err, yeah," she scratched the nape of her neck and managed a crooked nod.

Folding her arms and basing them on the desk, the Student Council's President asked, "And you're making a club to...?"

"It's going to be quite a task and we will use as much willing hand as we can get," Lisanna said. It came out plain, but honest. Her quirk of bluntness even in unwanted situations was refreshing.

Finally dropping her pen, her fingers made their ways to knock relentlessly against her chin, "How can I guarantee that you're not trying to violate the room and use it for personal purposes then?"

Uncertainty webbed slowly like dusty clogs, sharpened with giddy panic. I knew without looking that the two was struggling for words to shatter the benefit of doubt that was not in their favor.

Maybe it was because of the absence of pessimism I expected to sense, maybe it was the discomfort of the suppressing feelings that kept hanging onto me like plague and getting rid of them may mean a faster way out of this room, back to my own problem and my well-deserved lunch time. Whatever reason it was, I decided to just wing it anyway.

"Like you have any guarantee for the other clubs the first time they're requested?"

For the first time since our exchange, her reaction seemed more readable somehow. More visible. Less subtle. The faint raise of her brow, the mild drop of her jaw, matching with the surprise in her eyes. And why not, I realized, there certainly would be very few people who had the guts to elicit a problem with a Student Council President whose infamous reputation no one would go against. They certainly were either less sane, plainly stupid, or _well_, less than normal.

I was probably somewhere in between.

"They're requested by teachers," she answered later than a few beats, "The others are from much consideration."

"You're saying that ours is not at all worth your consideration," I shot back flatly, suddenly paranoid that all eyes were officially upon me.

Something amused tinged the air, "Depends."

Rather than disapproving first hand, she was trying to test us instead. The act while could hinder slacking students from taking advantage of the school facility with a barrier of their so-called club and reduce the gathering of ones with vague purposes, had earned her the label of respect, albeit in a feared way. This showed a proof that behind the skin of a steely Prez everyone was desired to obey, there lay someone with dedication who was simply trying her best in what she loved doing—or at least, what she thought was right in doing. If there is a prominent reason why she was elected, _this_ must be it.

"To say that our purpose rooted from mere interest may sound selfish. But isn't that how a club begins?" for a slip of second, my gaze met Levy's, " It grows from the intention of one to share what they enjoy. Besides, what is wrong in giving the best to what one genuinely loves?"

It sounded cheesy alright, I snorted mentally. How preachers and motivators were able to speak the simple golden words and towed faith in audience was beyond me. Coming from a mere teenager like me, it seemed like I was only spouting excuses to grant a selfish request. Levy's and Lisanna's purpose however, was probably far from selfish. Plausibly that was why, I figured, it kicked me out my neutral zone and made me—even if the slightest—want to fight along side them for what they believed was right.

"The books...I just want them to be read," Levy's quiet tone penetrated with a straight stare, "It's such a waste that they're not appreciated...I think."

"There's no other form of Literature Club anyway," Lisanna added, "It will be a new outlet to try for those who are interested."

The silence this time was puffed up with contemplation and held breaths and swirling anticipation.

"Why not."

We jolted. It was Lisanna who found her voice, "Excuse me?"

"I can't see why not," she repeated, "_But_," the triumphant group hug I was encased in froze, "I should approve on conditions."

Out of her pocket, a book in the size of a palm flapped open. The owner fixed her glasses. I was half-suspicious that they were only for the goal of taunting our teetering apprehension.

"The first main rule of creating a club," she stated, her voice almost molding into a smirk, "You need a minimum of five members upon establishment."

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><p><em>"But how can you walk away from something and still come back to it?"<em>

_—Neil Gaiman, Coraline_

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><p><strong>AN** : err, what has this chapter turned into I don't even know /hides in the corner/ It's been tweaked and fixed numerous times with scenes being replaced and stuffs and honestly I'm still not satisfied. The positive side is, this is the last of introductory (boring) chapters and we'll be seeing conflicts and rising actions soon enough.

Welp, feedback please? :)

~snowdrop03


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